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Cleveland Plain
Dealer
President
Obama tells Capital University crowd that
controlling college costs is a top priority
By Aaron Marshall
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
BEXLEY, Ohio --
President Barack Obama pushed a new message
in the fight for the presidency Tuesday, touting his administration's
efforts
to make college more affordable and contrasting them with opponent Mitt
Romney's proposed cuts to higher education funding.
Speaking before a
receptive crowd of 3,300, including many college
students, on the suburban Columbus campus of Capital University on a
sun-splashed afternoon, the Democrat emphasized his commitment to help
cut
college costs with federal grant and loan programs like the ones he
used to pay
for school.
"I am only standing
before you today because of the
chance my education gave me," Obama said. "So I can tell you with
some experience that making higher education more affordable for our
young
people is something I've got a personal stake in. It's something I've
made a
top priority of my presidency. And in Ohio, it's something that is very
much at
stake in this election."
With just six weeks
until early voting begins in Ohio, Obama
made his 10th trip to the state this year, focusing his pitch on his
efforts to
make higher education more accessible. He took credit for 3 million
more
students who received federal grants than under previous
administrations.
Romney's camp
quickly fired back, blaming the rising costs
of a college education on what they called Obama's failed economic
policies.
Obama's speech was
part of a two-day education-focused trip
to Ohio and Nevada -- a pair of the handful of swing states that will
make or
break his quest for a second term.
Telling the
debt-strapped students in the crowd, "I've
been in your shoes," Obama paraphrased remarks his Republican opponent
had
made recently in Ohio to draw a sharp contrast.
"A few months ago,
just up the road in Westerville,
Gov. Romney said if you want to be successful, if you want to go to
college or
start a business, you can just 'borrow money if you have to from your
parents,'" Obama said.
And in Youngstown,
the former Massachusetts
governor advised a high school student who asked about the
high cost of
college that "the best thing I can do for you is to tell you to shop
around," Obama said. "That's it – that's his plan," Obama said.
"That's his answer for a young person hoping to go to college – shop
around, borrow money from your parents."
Obama sought to tie
Romney's comments to a budget proposal
from his vice presidential candidate, Rep. Paul Ryan, that would cut
federal
student aid as part of a plan to help pay for more extensive tax cuts…
Read the rest of
the article at the Cleveland Plain Dealer
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