Cheap Shot

 Sometimes various forces in society combine to do something that makes us all look foolish. The Supreme Court decision wiping out the plan to forgive student loan debt is one of those actions.

President Biden’s plan has always been controversial with older people. Many conservatives opposed it because it is expensive; others objected on the principle that all debts must be repaid no matter what.

When it comes to such matters, on a personal level, I’ve always been averse to incurring debts and when it’s been necessary to do so, I try to pay them off as quickly as possible. I want to live within my means.

But I’m relatively fortunate. In today’s world we have millions of young people who have been raised in a manner that makes the crushing weight of student loans almost inevitable. They are told they won’t be able to get a decent job without a college degree, and the cost of getting one has steadily escalated over the years.

Then they got hit with Covid, a double whammy. Gen Z is reeling.

Perhaps the most disingenuous objection to debt relief for the young comes from certain people who say, “I paid off my loan. Why should they get a free ride?”

That’s what makes us all look small. Empathy for the youngest members of society is too often lacking, and that makes those of us living in richest land on earth look downright cheap.

LINKS:

• SCOTUS blocks Biden's student loan plan and limits LGBTQ protections in major rulings (CNN)

• Consumers and retailers brace for student loan payment restart (WP)

• The working-from-home illusion fades (Economist)

• Twitter’s New Chief Eases Into the Hot Seat (NYT)

• Christie says Trump wishes ‘he could be Putin in America’ (The Hill)

• Why Donald Trump Was So Mad at Mark Milley That He Confessed to a Crime (New Yorker)

• Ukraine’s top general, Valery Zaluzhny, wants shells, planes and patience (WP)

• The True Threat of AI (NYT)

• The first fully A.I.-generated drug enters clinical trials in human patients (CNBC)

• AI Foundation launches AI.XYZ to give people their own AI assistants (Venture Beat)

• Aaron Paul Thinks AI Is Scarier Than Any ‘Black Mirror’ Episode (Rolling Stone)

• “We Have Built a Giant Treadmill That We Can’t Get Off”: Sci-Fi Prophet Ted Chiang on How to Best Think About AI (Vanity Fair)

• VC billionaire Marc Andreessen says he wrote ‘Why AI will save the world’ because a ‘hysterical freakout has arrived in Washington’ (Fortune)

• Don’t Use A.I. to Cheat in School. It’s Better for Studying. (NYT)

• The Huge Power and Potential Danger of AI-Generated Code (Wired)

• How the U.S. is trying to stay ahead of China in the AI race (Axios)

• European companies claim the EU’s AI Act could ‘jeopardise technological sovereignty’ (The Verge)

• Why India Risks Falling Behind in the AI Race (Bloomberg)

• Artificial Intelligence Is Theft (National Review)

• Dangerous Heat and Heavy Wildfire Smoke March Across North America (NYT)

• French Riots Escalate as Macron Struggles to Respond (WSJ)

• More layoffs hit ESPN as Disney slashes costs (WP)

• Fixing deep-sea mining damage would be double the cost of extraction, study says (Reuters)

• In These Corners of Kabul, Western Influences Live On (NYT)

• CEO Relieved AI Can Never Replace Him If He Already Contributes Nothing To Company (The Onion)