Methinks I hit a nerve. Apollo Group responds

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by David Safier

I received a response to my post, "AZ Republicans demand tax break for Apollo Group, which increases fed deficit," from Ryan Rauzon, Apollo Group spokesman. First he sent me an email, then he sent essentially the same thing as a comment to the post.

I won't rebut what he said, except for two things. I'll leave the rest of the half truths for any BfA readers who wish to chime in.

First thing: I'm not the one who first asserted "Apollo Group was 'targeted' for tax cuts in return for an extension of federal unemployment benefits," Mr. Rauzon. It was Jan Brewer, who wrote in the Capitol Times,

Tobin wanted to couple the continuation of the EB [unemployment benefits] program with business tax cuts, including the possible revival of vetoed bills in some form based on the Invest Arizona property tax cut for new or expanding businesses (SB1041) or the corporate income tax cut for multi-state service providers such as Apollo Group (SB1552). [boldface added]

Your beef on that issue is with Brewer, not with me.

She also wrote in the same piece, "negotiations are on-going with the Apollo Group." You folks clearly are much more than an incidental part of this legislation.

Second thing: you write:

In the future, before you launch into another false attack, we suggest that you do your homework. Your readers deserve that much.

I imagine you're new to BfA, Mr. Rauzon, but if you look through our archives, you'll see I've written frequently about the way for-profit colleges, including University of Phoenix, rip off students and saddle them with burdensome loans while making huge profits from federal government funding. You might also note, I end the post with 8 links so others can do a fraction of the homework I have done on this issue.

In case you haven't read it, one of the best articles — not on the list, though it should have been — is one of the earliest I encountered, in the Nov/Dec, 2009 issue of the Washington Monthly, The Subprime Student Loan Racket. You might give it a read.

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2 thoughts on “Methinks I hit a nerve. Apollo Group responds”

  1. One of the two pieces you linked to in on the U of Phoenix website, which means it’s the company viewpoint. That makes it less than an objective piece of writing. The other is subscription only, so I can only read the first two paragraphs.

    Ryan, is your argument that U of Phoenix did things in the past it shouldn’t have but has mended its ways? That’s a very interesting argument. Basically, it means you’re saying I’m right about past practices, but the practices have changed. Is that what I’m hearing?

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