Looking into the crystal ball of the American economic future is a frightening prospect for a college student with less than a year until graduation.

Exactly what kind of economy are we as young Americans inheriting and where will we stand in the world marketplace in a few years?

More importantly, will we – as the country’s future entrepreneurs, innovators and workers – be allowed our chance at the American Dream? Will the United States still be the shining beacon of free enterprise and industry by the time the government is through?

The outlook doesn’t look pretty.

Every year I scoop up a glassy-eyed freshman and tell them the real rules of Cal Poly. I glanced at the survival guide this year and it’s the same thing they tell freshman every year; the same old recycled garbage that goes in one ear and out the other for 99 percent of new students.

These are the things I know about vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, in the order I learned them:

1) She is John McCain’s running mate though no one had heard of her two months ago

2) She is the governor of Alaska

3) She was a beauty queen and was recently on the cover of Vogue

4) Her husband works in the oil industry

5) Her 17-year-old daughter is having a baby

6) She is socially conservative (more so than McCain)

Politicians are now given a paparazzi-high level of celebrity status; this relatively unknown woman was thrown into the spotlight and can no longer have the luxury of a private life.