You need a degree because you need to make it look like you deserve your privileges, wealth, and power. It can't just look like "them that's got shall have"; it has to look like the best rise to the top. It needs to look like that so that the working class can continue to see themselves as losers who deserve to be losers.
Also, would Bush be less of a slimy moron if he had gotten straight A's in college? Clinton was a Rhodes scholar and still a pretty slimy piece of shit. You couldn't get much slimier unless your name was Hillary.
Joanna