There should be no "excuses" needed for receiving the (often very modest) retirement that was promised in the formal offer of employment. That employment was, for many professionals, accepted at a salary well below the average with the promise that benefits, including retirement payments, would at least in part offset that low salary which, compounded over the years, is a serious loss. No one said that the legislature and others would have their eyes on your retirement funds for the duration. 

Yes PERS is expensive. Everyone's retirements are expensive, as you know if you have no inheritance and have had to try save for one.  

If treating people fairly and legally and keeping contracts has become a "sob story," then we're in bad shape. If the small percentage of outliers becomes a ground for state confiscation of the retirements of ordinary old folks, then we've become something really awful.  

What we need are solid retirement systems for everyone, protected by law and courts.