In fact, it makes me sad when this happens. Thanks for the breath of fresh air. I give the Depressed Old Professor only a B- for his letter explaining why our system of higher education is a mess. The professor does not point out the mechanism that has allowed universities to radically lower their standards. The relentless deterioration of the university system has been caused by the so-called student evaluation of teaching questionnaires.
Most universities now force professors to hand out evaluation forms each semester.
Thus, if a professor has standards and tries to teach, the students will naturally retaliate by saying the professor is a bad teacher. Now the administrator has a weapon to force the faculty members to give easy grades. The department head or dean tells the hard professors that they are bad teachers and forces the instructors to improve their teaching. You guessed it. They inflate their grades and reduce the material covered.