By Nikhil Aziz Patriot Games I     mmigrant communities were targeted in
    the crackdown after 9/11/01, but they,
antiwar activists, and NGOs (See “Policing
Civil Society: NGO Watch,” in this issue),
are not the only ones under fire from the
Right in its war on dissent. Reminiscent of
the  McCarthy  era,  universities  and  col-
leges across the country, particularly the fac-
ulty who teach at them, are being attacked
in the name of patriotism, homeland secu-
rity, and the “war on terrorism.” It is impor-
tant to remember, as William Walker, in an
article in the Toronto Star writes, this new war against dissent is “being waged not just against students and professors, although
universities are where the major skirmishes
are taking place. Journalists, business peo-
ple, even retirees have been targeted for
speaking out. Some have been fired from
their jobs, received hate mail or been made
social  outcasts  for  exercising  their  First
Amendment right to freedom of speech.”¹       The American Council of Trustees and
Alumni (ACTA, see www.goacta.org), has
trained its rhetorical guns on college pro-
fessors who have questioned U.S. policies
since the attacks on 9/11/01. Founded by
(among others) Lynne Cheney, wife of Vice
President Dick Cheney and Senator Joe
Lieberman  (D-CT)  in  1995  as  the
National Alumni Forum (it changed its
name in 1998), ACTA published a list of
over 100 statements expressed in public by
faculty, staff, and students that are not in
accord with the current Administration’s
views. ACTA, according Walker, “cites a
‘blame America first’ bias among hundreds
of professors and is monitoring their anti-
war statements.”² The list itself is part of
a larger report put out by ACTA called, “Defending Civilization: How Our Uni-
versities Are Failing America and What
Can  Be  Done  About  It.”  Emily  Eakin
notes  in  the  New York Times,  that  the
report’s title page features an excerpt from
a  “speech  by  Mrs.  Cheney  calling  for
colleges to offer more courses on Ameri-
can history.”³       “‘We’re criticizing the dominant
campus orthodoxy that so often finds
that America and Western civilization
are  the  source  of  the  world’s  ills,’
said Anne D. Neal, vice president of
the council and a co-author of the
report… The cure for academe’s anti-
American  bias,  Ms.  Neal  and  her
co-author write, is what the council
has been advocating all along: more
courses  on  American  history  and
Western civilization. Ms. Neal said
that the council would send copies
of the report to 3,000 college and uni-
versity trustees.       Scholars protest that the council
is taking advantage of a national cri-
sis to further its [conservative and
Eurocentric]  academic  agenda.
‘Their aim is to enforce a particular
party line on American colleges and
universities,’ said Eric Foner, a pro-
fessor of American history at Colum-
bia University whose name appears
in the report. ‘Now they’re seizing
upon this particular moment and the
feeling  that  they’re  in  the  driver’s
seat  to  suppress  the  expression  of
alternative points of view.’”⁴       Jack  Calareso,  president  of  Ohio
Dominican  University,  noted  in  the Columbus  Dispatch  that,  “the  organiza- tion [ACTA] criticized the University of
California at Los Angeles for announcing plans to expand the number of courses it
offered on Islamic and Asian cultures, say-
ing, ‘In the rush to add courses, these insti-
tutions frequently reinforced the mind-set
that it was America and America’s failure
to understand Islam that were to blame.’
Are universities actually supporting ter-
rorism by fostering students’ understand-
ing of other cultures?”⁵  Calareso further
observes  that  the  “organization’s  report
flies in the face of its stated mission as a
‘nonprofit educational organization com-
mitted to academic freedom, excellence and
accountability on college campuses…sup-
porting programs and policies that encour-
age  high  academic  standards,  strong
curricula, and the free exchange of ideas on
campus.”⁶ Beyond creating lists, however, ACTA has sent “mass mailings to alumni of schools where  ‘offensive’  comments  have  been
made, urging donations be cut off and pres-
suring university trustees to take action.
One Florida professor, who didn’t have the
protection of being tenured, has already
been fired.” ⁷ ACTA is not the only group active in this arena. Americans for Victory Over Ter-
rorism (AVOT, see www.avot.org), founded
in 2002 by William Bennett (Ronald Rea-
gan’s education secretary and George H. W.
Bush’s “drug czar”), James Woolsey (CIA
director under George H. W. Bush), and
Frank Gaffney (who was assistant secretary
of defense for international security policy
under Ronald Reagan), is a group that,
according to an article in USA Today  by
Walter Shapiro, “stands ready to wage holy
war  against  those  who  would  weaken
America’s resolve to fight terrorism.”⁸       Most  right-wing  protagonists,  how-
ever,  equate  “America’s  resolve,”  with
George W. Bush’s foreign policy. Speaking The Public Eye THE PUBLIC EYE SPRING 2004 10 Campus Insecurity The Right’s Attack on Faculty, Programs, and Departments at U.S. Universities