Osama University?

[kskiska]

Neoconservative critics have long charged Middle Eastern studies departments with anti-American bias. Now they've enlisted Congress in their crusade.

On Oct. 21, the House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill that could require university international studies departments to show more support for American foreign policy or risk their federal funding. Its approval followed hearings this summer in which members of Congress listened to testimony about the pernicious influence of the late Edward Said in Middle Eastern studies departments, described as enclaves of debased anti-Americanism. Stanley Kurtz, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, a right-wing think tank, testified, "Title VI-funded programs in Middle Eastern Studies (and other area studies) tend to purvey extreme and one-sided criticisms of American foreign policy." Evidently, the House agreed and decided to intervene.

Emboldened by its dominance of Washington, the right is trying to enlist government on its side in the campus culture wars. "Since they are the mainstream in Washington think tanks and the right-wing corridors of Congress, they figure, 'Let's translate that political capital to education,'" says Rashid Khalidi, who was recently appointed to the Edward Said Chair of Arab studies at Columbia University.

more…
http://salon.com/news/feature/2003/11/06/middle_east/index.html

[La_Serpiente]

1. That's not right

now they are infringing on academic freedoms. The Congress should either stay out of this or force the Executive Department to have a better approach toward Middle Eastern countries and stop treating them as the World's Gas Station.

[LoZoccolo]

2. Slow-creep fascism.

Now it's serious. This and them cancelling that movie on the Chickenshit Broadcasting System.