If Kerry were a man he would concede

Re: Bush has not yet won

Republicans are in control of the House, so all Bush needed to win was 269. And unlike in 2002, the popular vote wasn't even close. It was a clean win. Our great President spanked John-John's heinzey by a few million votes, so Kerry's recent concession was the right thing to do. I am glad to see that he is not a sore loser.

With regards to education....
From institutional and professional accreditors, to college administrators and faculty, gatekeeper liberals are in control of higher education; probably by more than a 4 to 1 margin. If they wanted to lower tuition rates and make education more accessible, they could. But, they are elitists, so that won't happen voluntarily.

Blaming the Republican Party for outlandish tuition rates just won't work. Think about it: Which party has actually proposed real tuition regulation? Unlike John Kerry's [bad] idea of raising Title IV student loan caps, Republicans (especially Rep McKeon R-CA) have worked hard to put forth good ideas.

Schools are businesses, and as such, should be able to raise tuition as much as they want. That is the American way. However, colleges also participate in Federal student loan programs. Therefore, if their tuition increases are unconscionable, they should lose their student loan eligibility.

Here is the message we need to send to our colleges….
You can raise tuition all you want, but when you cross the line, you should lose your Title IV loan privileges. I think this would be a fair way to deal with the liberal induced tuition crisis. It might also prevent lousy tier 4 colleges (who often charge 20+k per year) from allowing under-qualified faculty members take sabbaticals, while shifting the cost to us.

 

I have a better idea. Eliminate ALL federal funding for student aid. This would FORCE private schools to reduce costs or die.

 

You're right, we'd be stuck in a war no matter what. Of course, whom do we thank for that? In fact, I think one reason Bush was reelected, given that most people in this country think Iraq is a mess, is that people were reluctant to make a change mid-stream (use of "mid" is a figure of speech and wildly optimistic). It was sort of a case of "it's Bush's mess; he has to fix it."

We'll never know if Kerry could have done things differently. I believed him when he said he would work on building a coalition, and rebuilding our reputation, if for no other reason than he committed to it again and again in the debates. The Republicans ridiculed that idea endlessly, which I thought was the height of ignorance. Bush has nearly ruined our reputation worldwide, and then the Republicans ridiculed Kerry for having the temerity to want to fix that? What a radical idea - that we should try and get along with countries that, like it or not, are important to us. We will never be THAT much of a superpower that we can afford to thumb our nose at the rest of the world.

Unlike what others have said on this forum, the President DOES have some control over the economic climate in this country. Markets and macroeconomic conditions are not completely controlled by randomness. Markets do react to $400 billion deficits. Markets do react to an economy that is not adding jobs. To throw up your hands (Dave, I'm talking to others here) and say the President has no control over this stuff is naive. This from a guy (me) who has spent a good portion of his life studying randomness, and who (me again) is very quick to point out when skill is continually confused for luck. I believe in the power of random events to explain a lot of things. Nevertheless, I'm not willing to accept that we, as a government and society, have no control over which way our economy is heading. I think Kerry understands this better than Bush.

You write, "How about thinking of how we can work together for the best interests of liberals, conservatives, and every one in between? I guess I think you would have wanted that if Kerry had won. How about it Tom?" Dave, I'm all for it. I agree with you, and I will. I need to know that Bush is doing the same. Let's hope he moves more in that direction over the next four years than he did in the last four.

I agree with EJ Dionne in the Wash. Post who wrote that the "failure" of Bush so far has been the squandering of the national unity that existed after 9-11. By definition he has certainly squandered it. How can we get it back unless he changes his direction somewhat? How likely is that to happen? Instead he found a way to start up a war between “our” God and “theirs”, “our” way of life against “theirs.” After 9-11 we had a quarrel with a radical sect of Islam. Now we have a big war that involves much of the rest of the Muslim world. How did that happen? Let's all agree to meet again in four years and see where we are.

 

Learn

No one said that markets are random they are not random at all. They are in fact cyclical and governent intervention at best has short term effects on their progression. Social structures and technical innovation also have great impact and that is quite frankly where government policy has a greater effect than it ever has through fiscal policy.