I would like to offer observations on the ASTP program described in “Cadets on Campus” in Fall 2022.
It’s a shame the program was so demanding that it had a high failure rate.
World War II was a war of technology, not just brute force. Scientists and engineers of all disciplines were mobilized nationwide to develop new weapons, new defenses, and new logistical tools to better fight the war. Graduates of the ASTP program would be most valuable in those endeavors.
I’m not sure what schools Drexel had in those days, but the quartermaster would have needed ways to preserve food to ship it overseas, then prepare it for troops. Uniforms had to be tough enough to withstand brutal conditions in the South Pacific. Military contracts and procurement had to be coordinated to avoid waste and speed production.
In short, I would think almost every Drexel student and professor could’ve been involved in the war effort, and graduates of the ASTP would’ve been welcomed.
A more realistic program would’ve better served all involved.
Lee Winson
BS management computer information systems
Yardley, Pennsylvania
Editor’s Note: This is an edited response to a letter about “Lifers Speak Out on the Right to Redemption” from the Winter/Spring 2022 issue.
Though only 5% of the world’s population lives in the United States, it is home to 30% of the world’s life-sentenced population. Nearly half of all Americans have a family member who has been incarcerated. Most people incarcerated here are serving time for a serious or violent crime, which makes it more necessary to understand why violence happens.
Setting aside the debate over the role of prisons in facilitating redemption, the purpose of prisons should be to keep our communities safer. Life sentencing does not do this. Most people simply age out of criminal behavior. People released from life sentences are statistically the least likely to re-offend. For many of them, prison has zero public safety justification, yet each year, the cost to incarcerate elderly individuals is as high as nine times the cost to incarcerate someone younger.
While China does execute many, no reliable numbers exist. However, more than 200,000 people are serving life sentences in the United States; overwhelmingly, people of color. China’s number of executions would not compete; and the very rhetorical act of placing the two countries in comparison is, I think, clear evidence that the United States’ mass incarceration policies are a human rights catastrophe.
[We should] examine why communities of color have higher rates of incarceration. The vast majority of people in prison experienced serious childhood traumas and I would encourage [everyone] to consider the United States’ centuries-long relationship with systemic racism. For generations, families of color have been prevented from accumulating familial wealth, accessing basic social supports, and have been buffeted by cycles of over-policing and incarceration (consider that the incarceration of a parent is a serious trauma to a child). All along, the public safety policies that impact these communities have been written by more wealthy and white Americans.
Peter D. Eisenberg
MD medicine ’72 (Hahnemann)
San Anselmo, California