Interesting discussion. I'm not siding with anybody, but I just want to suggest that unqualified absolutes lead to misplaced responses.

For example (and I'm not picking on pumeco - just an example)

• " If you rely upon the system, you are always going to be hounded by it and that's all there is to it, there's no getting away from that. "

You know that's not true. I relied on the system just fine. I paid off my student loan at the age of 24 when my girlfriend at the time asked "If you hate writing checks so much, why don't you just pay that damn thing off?" Yes, the system allowed me, in just two years, to accumulate enough money to pay all four years of my college.

I have two daughters - one finished college and the other has one more year, and both educations I paid for with cash. The system seems great to me.

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Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)