Very interesting response.
In honesty, I expected him to hit the points that he addressed, thus very little surprised me.
The only thing that surprised me in his statement is that the USNA cadet who did not graduate cost 170K. I have always heard the number to float closer to 400K.
I believe there is a need for the SA's, and their existence. However, this subject always comes up more often now then decades ago because there are many flag officers who went the ROTC route, most notably Colin Powell, and left leaning papers like NYT, believe it is a waste of tax payer dollars. Truth is gone are the days to make O-7+ you had to be a ring knocker. Today, many O-7+ come from different commissioning sources.
My answer to them when they want to stop funding SA's is very simple...Yale, Harvard and many private institutions have endowment funds that could afford to cover every undergrad's cost for four yrs without denting their principal. Will the NYT make the same case with them using Federal funds (Pell Grants) while the college could go into their pockets instead of the taxpayers? Doesn't the Ivies allow AA students in? Don't they accept special students? Tell me would Emma Watson have been accepted to Columbia if she wasn't in Harry Potter? How about Brooke Shields to Princeton (she majored in French, not drama)? Tiger Woods to Stanford? I could make the list go on and on of students that were accepted because of the clout they bring to the school, not their academic prowess.
Last time I checked the SA's at least can say it is academic skills that opened the door, not their name, or one particular skill.
Finally, why was anyone shocked that the NYT wrote the original piece? That would be akin to being shocked that the WAPO supports Obama in everything.