businessBy David Halperin. With the May 27 deadline approaching to submit comments to the U.S. Department of Education, big for-profit colleges are pulling out all the stops to gut the Obama Administration's proposed "gainful employment" rule, which is aimed at curbing predatory career training programs.  Taking some of the $33 billion a year they've been getting from taxpayers, the industry is spending big on lobbyists, with a continued heavy emphasis on hiring former Members of Congress and ex-Capitol Hill staffers. Buttressed by a steady flow of campaign contributions from the for-profit college industry to legislators, these lobbyists lean on their former Capitol Hill colleagues to lean on the White House to water down the rule, as happened in 2011 with a prior version of the regulation (which the industry then managed to get thrown out entirely by a federal judge). More...