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The following podcast contains explicit language.

Welcome to the Slate Political Gab Fest for May 30th, 2014, the college WhyBother edition.

Today is Santa Barbara Killer, Elliott Roger, an aberration or is America increasingly dangerous for women?

Why has this massacre prompted such a vigorous debate about sex and violence, but not about guns?

Then American higher education costs away too much, students are drowning in debt, and it's not even clear that going to college is a good investment.

President Obama has a plan to improve it all with a federal ratings program for colleges, so why are university presidents so scared of it?

Then a bold new attempt to save Detroit by tearing down a third of its buildings?

Could it possibly work? It can't possibly work, but we'll pretend that it can.

I'm David Plott, I'm the editor of Slate, I'm here in Washington. Slate, senior editor, Emily Bazzlon is of course in New Haven.

Although you're in New Haven, you're in North Haven, apparently, which I didn't realize until today.

Yeah, that's just a level of specificity too far, don't you think?

Yeah, but I've been saying New Haven for all this time, and it's actually not even true.

And Dickerson is off reporting somewhere, so that means we have a special guest making his Gab Fest debut.

Is Don Hose of CNN.

He does his own drum roll.

The lead, do you have to do that for your TV show, Jay?

...