A bunch of terms are thrown around in this context in daily discussions online: police state, civil liberties, curtailing of freedoms; mostly stuff that comes from a militarization of a society. You take the DHS and its buying of 1.4 billion hollow point rounds of ammo[1]; the fact that the hated TSA is now creating a VIPR program for highways & road patrols[2]; FEMA programs for emergency[3] and so many others.
What Ike Eisenhower spoke about (from a libertarian perspective he was arguably a good president, better than the people who followed), is that a growing militarization and the creation of wars to expend that military and its renewal, would inevitably increase the national debt.
Now that there is no way to pay that debt down[4], there is going to be civil unrest. The hidden tax - inflation is going to make people poorer and eventually create social problems. This military will then be used for another purpose: civil discipline.
The only way to change it is to default; who the hell's going to pay $222 Tn? Because of the dollar devaluation (again due to the debt), the Chinese are not buying. 61% of the T-bills were bought by the Fed last year[5]. Because of large number of baby boomers retiring, Social Security will become cash-flow negative by 2018 and bankrupt by 2033.[6]
tl;dr I guess my point is that this permanent militarization was obvious and intentional.
I think this theory deserves its own blog post, with a bit more detail.
I am not sure I follow the unpayable debt -> civil unrest step of the argument.
I think the overall theory is probably a stretch, but I think you're really onto something.
For one thing, the creation of massive federal police a la DHS and TSA is extremely scary to me, and something people should be paying more attention to.
For example, hypothetically, what would signifiy the "tipping point" where those with means to do so, should flee the country? Probably the elimintation of free speech, but what if it's too late by then? Take note that "liberals" are already demanding the beginning of the end of free speech under the guise of "campaign finance reform."
Another thing people should be paying more attention to is figuring out the effect of the debt spiral and continual inflation (presumably quantitative easing will continue indefinitely). At what point should I convert all USD holdings to other things? And should those other things include, say, domestic real estate, or should they be only gold (and bitcoin :) )? The answer to that would depend on the earlier "tipping point" thing.
To those who think this is all a meaningless rant: Protection of individual rights (the Constitution) has been eroding for centuries, which is reaching its culmination, and the US is reapidly becoming a police state. Wake up.
Is the crux of that argument that sourcing the funding would put at risk people who might support a candidate's causes, but whose safety might be compromised by identification? It is an honest question; I haven't followed that case closely.
So, for example, someone living in the rural south that wants to back gay rights, or something of the sort? That would tie back to the entire Google+ real-names debate, then.
The military (designed to fight wars vs. nation states, either overseas or potentially at home) has done far less to screw up American culture than the militarized law enforcement and domestic "anti-terrorism" which started with the War On Some Drugs and escalated a lot after 9/11 (and Seattle WTO, etc.).
This looks like off topic reddit-bait if I ever saw it:
"Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.": http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
There are so many other places to discuss politics, and so few that are good at startups and tech... please, let's keep this stuff out of here.
Notice that militaristic entertainment was culturally well entrenched way before there was anything to play video games on. War adventure films, boarding schools, Scouts.
The military industrial complex was at its peak in late 20th century. As the author says, military spending per GDP has substantially declined now.
What I think has happened is the abolishing of draft, giving the rise to modern action movie and related video games later. This and the readjustment of gender roles in modern society has bred a crop of men who never had a chance to grow out of playground war games.
Considering I don't even know what that phrase means, I will say 'no'. I'm curious, too, what level of schooling you mean: grade (K-12) or university. I have lived in the US my entire life and went through public school. I'll vouch that critical discussions of such things is not broached, generally. Consider the media frenzy a little while ago regarding the (minor) re-wording of the Pledge of Allegiance, as said in grade schools.
Having just finished Chris Hedges' "War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning", I will also vouch that main-stream US media is largely bereft of this level of unflinching critical discourse. I'm somewhat heartened to see this article appearing on NYTimes.com. The core of the message, for me, is the line 'But no institution — particularly one financed by the taxpayers — should be immune from thoughtful criticism.'
And the author nails the fact that none in the political sphere can proffer these dissensions without facing derision. The whole discourse seems like a ratcheting forward to an escalation of war-mongering. Finding alternative uses for funds and citing the possible security failure of a war mono-culture should indeed provide a viable alternative, but again, prime-time outlets don't trade in that currency. The tired sound bites of 'valor' and 'patriotism' reign ascendant.
The honest resistance against this tide will probably be quiet desperation for some time yet. Hedges came to my attention lately for standing the opposition to section 1021 and 1022 in the US NDAA 2012 in courts. But his work, and that of many others, doesn't make pleasant water-cooler talk. I was born in the waning days of the civil rights movements and often wonder why we don't mobilize for peace as well anymore. I think we've become contented -- fat, dumb, and happy -- but it might also be the gradual swing back towards a police state: useful response necessarily maintains a cautious economy of action.
It's largely poetry from the first world war. If ou study the individuals writing it you can sometimes watch the poetry go from talk of honour, duty and glory to talk of death, confusion, panic, misery, blood, mud and damned stupidity at all levels.
It shows you that war is not an adventure, it is massacre.
[1]http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/09/why_does_homelan...
[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visible_Intermodal_Prevention_a...
[3]http://www.freedomfiles.org/war/fema.htm
[4]http://godfatherpolitics.com/6914/its-not-16-trillion-its-22...
[5]http://www.moneynews.com/Headline/fed-debt-Treasury/2012/03/...
[6]http://www.justfactsdaily.com/in-spite-of-public-claims-soci...
edit: typos and spacing edit edit: added a fact.