So I see #CancelStudentDebt is currently the top trend on Twitter.

This is a gimmick of Sanders. That is, when he makes statements like this, about cancelling student debt, it is only to get himself in the news. Because he knows there are many people out there who will gravitate towards it.

But in reality, student debt comes in a variety of forms, and it is not clear to me that the US government can even “cancel” a debt between private individuals (remember, many students have gotten loans from lenders that are not the gov’t) outside of executing bankruptcy in court.

Personally I think the whole you-have-to-go-to-college-so-let-us-lend-you-thousands trap has been just that - a trap to get people who otherwise aren’t really interested in academic study caught into believing they have to do something when their lives may be much better if they didn’t make that choice.