***The Solution To The Student Debt Crisis- 21- A Film Review
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
DVD Review
21, starring Kevin Spacey, Lawrence Fishburne, 2007
Everybody and their brother (and sister too) knows by now that the current student debt crisis in America is out of hand. Kids trying to get a serious higher education that might keep them off the streets, off the public dole, and gainfully employed in someplace other than bottom- feeder Wal-mart or Mickey D's are practically becoming indentured servants to the banks and other lending agencies in order to get out from under such a fate. Over the long haul we really are going to have to promote, as a matter of public policy, of social survival policy, a program of free quality higher education for all who want to go that route. Of course that proposition today is pie-in-the-sky and is a question for the future. So what is a kid, a hard- working grind of a kid, totally committed to getting him or herself a higher education to do in the meantime ? Well, one possible solution is presented by the film under review, 21.
And that is the solution not just the title of the movie. Basically go to Vegas (or I suppose Atlantic City or some other such gambling venue) and play 21. Simple, simply work out a system of counting cards and presto you are rich, rich enough anyway to grab that higher education. In the film it is a nerdy guy, an MIT grind, who through hard work and,well, grind has been accepted in Harvard Medical School in order to pursue his dream of being a doctor. But he has no dough , no $300,000 price tag dough, and so it looks like no go for our young hero. Except a fairy godfather (really an MIT professor) shows our student the way forward through working as a team with four other "best and brightest" to grab lots of dough "under the radar" with the professor's system. A system he had worked out and perfected from the days when he was a card-counter, now retired, in the old days.
Oh yeah, there is one little problem. No, not the problem that one might get addicted to beating the odds and go overboard, begin to like the "life" while having tons of fun being comped and everything in Vegas (including a little fling with one of the female team members).That 's nothing. No, the problem is that those casinos in the desert (or anywhere ),well, frown on card-counters. And they are more than willing to do something about it whether you are some weary old professor or a young MIT grind. Watch the film to see what the "they" (led by Lawrence Fishburne) are willing to do about the problem. As for non-elite college students, non-grinds, non-math memory whizzes, or the merely timid. perhaps you should think about fighting for that social policy of free quality higher education mentioned above.
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
DVD Review
21, starring Kevin Spacey, Lawrence Fishburne, 2007
Everybody and their brother (and sister too) knows by now that the current student debt crisis in America is out of hand. Kids trying to get a serious higher education that might keep them off the streets, off the public dole, and gainfully employed in someplace other than bottom- feeder Wal-mart or Mickey D's are practically becoming indentured servants to the banks and other lending agencies in order to get out from under such a fate. Over the long haul we really are going to have to promote, as a matter of public policy, of social survival policy, a program of free quality higher education for all who want to go that route. Of course that proposition today is pie-in-the-sky and is a question for the future. So what is a kid, a hard- working grind of a kid, totally committed to getting him or herself a higher education to do in the meantime ? Well, one possible solution is presented by the film under review, 21.
And that is the solution not just the title of the movie. Basically go to Vegas (or I suppose Atlantic City or some other such gambling venue) and play 21. Simple, simply work out a system of counting cards and presto you are rich, rich enough anyway to grab that higher education. In the film it is a nerdy guy, an MIT grind, who through hard work and,well, grind has been accepted in Harvard Medical School in order to pursue his dream of being a doctor. But he has no dough , no $300,000 price tag dough, and so it looks like no go for our young hero. Except a fairy godfather (really an MIT professor) shows our student the way forward through working as a team with four other "best and brightest" to grab lots of dough "under the radar" with the professor's system. A system he had worked out and perfected from the days when he was a card-counter, now retired, in the old days.
Oh yeah, there is one little problem. No, not the problem that one might get addicted to beating the odds and go overboard, begin to like the "life" while having tons of fun being comped and everything in Vegas (including a little fling with one of the female team members).That 's nothing. No, the problem is that those casinos in the desert (or anywhere ),well, frown on card-counters. And they are more than willing to do something about it whether you are some weary old professor or a young MIT grind. Watch the film to see what the "they" (led by Lawrence Fishburne) are willing to do about the problem. As for non-elite college students, non-grinds, non-math memory whizzes, or the merely timid. perhaps you should think about fighting for that social policy of free quality higher education mentioned above.
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