The interest rate of student loans was raised to 6.8% last July 1st. Soon after, the senate failed to agree to reverse the rate increase. Education has traditionally been seen as a means to upward mobility, yet the cost of an education keeps going up making it necessary for many to borrow often large sums. Perhaps it is to be expected that a report issued not long before the senate’s inaction, found that a key reason why first time home buyers are being kept out of the market is student loans. They aren’t able to afford both loan repayment and a mortgage. Then there’s the passing of the farm bill minus the food stamps provisions possibly threatening the future of a program which as David Brooks discovered when he wanted to write a column about it, helps a lot more people than he had originally realized. An observer can’t help wonder if when put together, all this would not contribute to a two tiers America. It makes the fact that the Congress was not able to find a way to act on these, and other issues relating to the needs of the people they are there to serve, more than irresponsible. It is insolent, an affront to the needs of those who elected them.