It isn’t every day that the Washington Post comes out against a policy of the Obama administration, but in a recent editorial, it did just that.

The Department of Education has proposed new rules that would tighten “gainful employment” regulations on for-profit colleges, cutting off financial aid to programs whose graduates have an unacceptably high ratio of student debt relative to their incomes. Insofar as such a rule brings more accountability to higher ed by focusing on student outcomes, it is coming from the right place. But as the Post notes, these new regulations will be very selectively applied.

Administration officials deny they are singling out for-profit institutions, arguing that the measures tying student debt and loan default to financial aid would apply to all career-training programs. Blurred in that claim is that degree programs in the for-profit sector would have to meet the stringent new standards but degree programs offered by public and private nonprofit institutions would not.

This double standard makes little sense. While for-profits certainly have their failings, there is no reason that non-profit institutions should be unfairly shielded from accountability. Given that for-profit, career-oriented programs often serve low-income individuals who desperately need skills and credentials, this targeting of for-profits seems even more wrongheaded.

The key to real accountability is across-the-board transparency. Every type of college ought to make key measures of success, audited by a third-party, publicly available in order to receive federal funds. Selective enforcement won’t do.