The Democrats: The Party of the Elite College Education
18th February 2015
Forbes dishes the dirt.
Democrats are supposedly the party of the poor and oppressed, mightily concerned about the distribution of income and the concentration of wealth – right? And Republicans are the party of business and the affluent, more concerned about expanding income, including that of the rich and wealthy, right? If these characterizations are correct, you would expect the political leaders for the Democrats to come from humble educational backgrounds befitting their allegedly populists beliefs. You would expect Republican leaders to be graduates of our nation’s academically gated communities, the highly selective rich private schools where even today most students come from affluent backgrounds.
In reality, this is all wrong – badly so. Republican political leaders come from far more humble educational backgrounds than their Democratic counterparts. And, for all their talk about income equality, the Democratic leadership has historically protected and expanded educational inequality through its actions, widening the gap between the rich and poor colleges, those considered distinguished and those considered ordinary.