{"id":129949,"date":"2022-08-31T07:02:14","date_gmt":"2022-08-31T11:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=129949"},"modified":"2022-08-31T07:02:14","modified_gmt":"2022-08-31T11:02:14","slug":"wp-opinion-student-loan-forgiveness-stolen-valor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=129949","title":{"rendered":"WP Opinion: Student Loan Forgiveness = Stolen Valor"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In an OpEd that appeared in the Washington Post, commentator Marc Thiessen makes a case that Biden’s student loan forgiveness leverages a law that was intended to help servicemembers.<\/p>\n

Opinion: Biden\u2019s loan forgiveness is an act of stolen valor<\/strong><\/a>
\nBy Marc A. Thiessen<\/em><\/p>\n

[lines deleted]<\/p>\n

But here is the worst part of all: Biden\u2019s plan is an act of stolen valor. He is claiming authority for student-loan forgiveness by invoking the 2003 Heroes Act \u2014 a law passed after the 9\/11 attacks to support the men and women mobilized to fight terrorists and to make sure that they did not default because of their military service. The law explicitly states that it is designed to help the \u201chundreds of thousands of Army, Air Force, Marine Corps, Navy, and Coast Guard reservists and members of the National Guard [who] have been called to active duty or active service\u201d and asked to \u201cput their lives on hold, leave their families, jobs, and postsecondary education in order to serve their country.\u201d It authorizes the secretary of education to modify or forgive their postsecondary loans on a case-by-case basis \u201cin connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency, regardless of the location at which such active duty service is performed.\u201d In 2007, when Congress made the Heroes Act permanent, it explicitly reiterated that it was acting to address \u201cthe unique situations that active duty military personnel and other affected individuals may face\u201d (emphasis added).<\/p>\n

Now Biden is using a law designed for active-duty service men and women as a pretext to provide loan forgiveness for those who never wore the uniform. Indeed, he is giving students who did not serve broader benefits than those who did. In so doing, he is effectively turning an entire generation of Americans into military impostors \u2014 receiving the benefits of military service they did not render. Imagine if he found a loophole in the GI bill to allow students who did not serve to obtain the same military scholarships as veterans. There would be widespread outrage. This is no different. The bill is called the Heroes Act for a reason. Americans who take out loans they can\u2019t afford to repay are not heroes \u2014 and should not be treated as if they were.<\/p>\n

So yes, Biden\u2019s plan is inflationary, regressive, unfair, unaffordable and unconstitutional. But worst of all, it is un-American \u2014 because it is an affront to all the servicemembers who risked their lives on the field of battle to keep the rest of us safe.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is the first time I have heard this angle on this controversy.<\/p>\n

This is a tough issue for me.\u00a0 Full disclosure – I do have student loan debt and although I disagree with the forgiveness program in principle, I’m somewhat conflicted about turning the relief down if offered.\u00a0 It doesn’t make me inclined to change my voting preferences, which I think was the program’s intent.<\/p>\n

There were many years I was between jobs and couldn’t afford to make student loan payments, so they heaped on incredible penalties and interest, more than doubling the amount they said I owed.\u00a0 Although I do not feel a sense of entitlement for any relief, I do feel I’ve paid off the original loan at least once over and maybe twice.\u00a0 After that dark chapter in my life, I have been making consistent payments for almost twenty years so in my mind what I owe represents interest and penalties.<\/p>\n

Far better to have just offered relief on the interest rate, in my opinion.<\/p>\n

Another thing – when I went through an unemployment period many years ago I constantly had to field phone calls about my inability to pay the loan.\u00a0 At that time, I wished they had a program to help me work off the loan.\u00a0 I had time on my hands, but no money.\u00a0 I often wished they had a program where I could check in at a library, school, police station, firehouse, or some state or federal agency and log hours doing a menial job.\u00a0 No money exchange, but the time would be credited in dollars against my student loan.\u00a0 It would be the equivalent of having a part-time job so who wouldn’t work a Thursday night to put a dent in their loan obligation?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In an OpEd that appeared in the Washington Post, commentator Marc Thiessen makes a case that … WP Opinion: Student Loan Forgiveness = Stolen Valor<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":663,"featured_media":129950,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/663"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=129949"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129949\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":129951,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129949\/revisions\/129951"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/129950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=129949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=129949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=129949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}