In the belief that public understanding of the Middle East will strengthen American security, the government subsidizes the work of Middle Eastern studies programs at universities around the country. But while trying to encourage the study of foreign languages and areas of the world that pose a challenge to U.S. interests, Congress is inadvertently pouring millions of dollars into the hands of some of the most anti-American scholars in the academy, explains Stanley Kurtz in an article from National Review Online. And since some of these federal funds must go toward outreach programs that educate elementary and high-school students, the result is taxpayer-subsidized courses to train teachers about the Middle East prepared by authors who have made outrageously anti-American statements since September 11th. This list includes such figures as Tariq Ali (who says that George Bush and Osama bin Laden are two peas in a pod, violent fundamentalists each, and calls for an end to the U.S. presence in the Middle East), Arundhati Roy (who has called bin Laden Bush's twin and said that the Taliban's sins can't begin to compare to the genocidal actions of the coalition against terror), and Robert Fisk (who has denied that the war has anything to do with the struggle of democracy against terror), all included in a set of teacher-training resources assembled by the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Because Middle Eastern studies programs at most American universities are dominated by an ideology known as "post-colonialism," Kurtz explains, they do little to enhance America's security. A set of ideological blinders has prevented them from taking the threat of terrorism seriously, he writes, so instead of alerting the country to the problem, scholars have instead criticized as racists or bigots those few policymakers who have warned of the coming terror. But rather than ending the flow of federal funds to these centers, Congress is about to massively increase their funding. For details see "Anti-Americanism in the Classroom," by Stanley Kurtz, National Review Online, May 16, 2002.
