The Journal Gazette, a local newspaper serving Fort Wayne, recently ran this piece about the drop in per-student college aid. It was forecast that the amount of aid would necessarily go down for at least the next couple years, but now we’re getting some of the exact numbers.

The Gazette had this to say,

Even though there is more money to work with, the state must spread it out among more students…[because] the economic downturn led more than 60,000 additional Indiana students to apply for financial aid.

Also, in a related matter, IU Bloomington has proposed a 4.6 percent in state tuition hike for next year, and double digit hikes for some graduate schools (especially law school).

It’s somewhat upsetting to me that this hasn’t gotten nearly the coverage that the death of Michael Jackson or the affair of Gov. Sanford has gotten. I’m not sure what criteria should be used to determine whose obituaries ought to be covered in the press – whose are newsworthy. Whether their death will have a significant impact on the present? Whether we should reminisce about their past importance? Whether it’s a slow news day?

Sadly (or not, depending on who you are), former Secretary of Defense and former President of the World Bank, Robert McNamara, died this past week. His death is somewhat confusing for me, who as a liberal minded youngster despised the man. But as I’ve grown up (and wised up?) I have come to see him in a different light, through a different worldview. I’m not sure how I feel, yet. No doubt there are others like myself. In fact, Errol Morris, legendary documentary filmmaker who made a movie about McNamara called The Fog of War, captured this confusion brilliantly in a New York Times op-ed.

A few weeks ago we had a staff ed that criticized the Obama administration for not taking an active lead on repealing DOMA. Since the economy has completely taken up the media limelight he hasn’t had much political pressure, aside from gay rights groups, to push for change (change that could shut his political windows on other issues). However, the limelight could shift somewhat in the weeks to come. Massachusetts, the first state to legalize gay marriage, has just sued the federal government because of DOMA.