Now, you're asking the right question. But the answer to that question lies in politics. And unfortunately, there is nothing anyone can say that can take care of that. Our enlisted might take orders from officers; and officers take orders from Generals; and if the military could stay at that level with all their decisions, things would be much better. But they aren't. The generals take orders from appointed and elected officials. And those politicians care about votes and maintaining power.
When you take all the active duty and reserve and add all the retired military, you still only come up with about 4 million members. That's a little over 1% of the population. Unfortunately, even with all the military supporters, we aren't a major voting block. The politicians will always go after military spending whenever they can. They claim it's such a large part of the federal budget. It is; but not more than the money spent on social programs. But there's a lot more voters receiving public assistance and entitlements than the military. And politicians aren't going to pi$$ them off.
The military definitely has some waste in it and can afford to be cut back. But so can many of the social spending in the country. Unfortunately, this is something that we can't control. Many of us here have seen the military cut back on numerous occasions. And in time, the government realizes that they totally screwed up, and they have to try and rebuild again. We saw it in the 70's with a rebuild in the 80's. Then another big cut in the 90's; with another rebuild after 9-11. Well, it's happening again. Politicians won't go after the social programs, so the military gets hit. The only good thing about the sequester, is that most government agencies have to do some cutting.
So whether it's rumors or not. Whether the academy prep school stays open or closes. None of us has any say so over it. If it stays open, it won't be because of the great service it provides in contributing to a fine officer corp. And if it's shut down, it won't be because some people think it's a waste. The reason it stays open or closes will be because the military will have to prioritize the funds they do have, and they'll choose things like the prep-school accordingly. Remember; there's a lot of people who don't believe the military should get a pension. They don't care that for 20+ years, a military member and their family had to sacrifice everything. Including building a career that could be much more lucrative. They don't care about any of the sacrifices. There's basically 99% of the population who aren't military affiliated; with the majority of them having no true understanding of the importance the military has on their lives or the country.
So again; whether the prep-school remains open or is shut down, it will have absolutely nothing to do with whether it's a benefit or not to the military. That has nothing to do with the final decision. Only politics and priority of the funds the politicians give the military.