Lots of people look down their noses at community colleges. Many people believe they aren't "real" colleges and they don't think about them in terms of the "college" experience, or "going to college." Evidently Rick Santorum is one of those people.
I can't see anybody arguing that at least community college for every American kid isn't a good goal. That's practical. It isn't snobby. It's REAL American life the way REAL American families live it.
When Rick Santorum berated the president for wanting every kid to go to college, he obviously wasn't thinking about community colleges. Obama was. Santorum's is not an uncommon frame of mind. But it's a snobby frame of mind, oblivious to the way REAL Americans live.
Lots of my friends and relatives went to community college at some point, either for job training skills or as a stepping stone to another school. There's no shame in it. It is a college. And for many, it's merely a bookend to a substandard and/or underfunded high school experience. Not everyone is born to a family like Rick Santorum's or lives in a safe little suburb like he always has. Some students need a few extra years to make up for the shortcomings of their surroundings and/or their schools. Not that Rick Santorum would care what it's like growing up black or latino in an urban area. Or white and poor for that matter.
The real snobs in all of this are as usual the Republicans. Republicans like Rick Santorum who evidently forgot about community colleges entirely.
We all want our kids to at least get a shot at community college, if for whatever reason other things don't work out. That's not snobbery.
That's being a REAL American.
But Rick Santorum evidently can't relate. Why should we be surprised? He's lived a fat soft puddy textured life, after all - he being the elitist snob that he is.