The decade after the 9/11 attacks has seen the creation of a profitable cottage industry of self-styled "experts" on Islam. As Sarah Posner recently noted in an article on Religion Dispatches, anti-Muslim fear-mongers, ranging from politicians to national security experts, have "cultivated a wide-ranging conspiracy theory that totalitarian Islamic radicals are bent on infiltrating America, displacing the Constitution, and subverting Western-style democracy in the U.S. and around the globe." 

What hasn't gotten a comprehensive look, at least until now, is how public tax dollars have been funding parts of this industry under the guise of counter-terrorism trainings for city and state law enforcement across the country, which after 9/11 has gotten heavily involved in fighting terrorism.

A recently released report by the Political Research Associates, a group that monitors the right in America, puts the spotlight on how "public servants are regularly presented with misleading, inflammatory, and dangerous information about the nature of the terror threat." The report, titled, "Manufacturing the Muslim Menace:  Private Firms, Public Servants, and the Threat to Rights and Security," examines frames - like "Islam is a terrorist religion," or "mainstream Muslim-Americans have terrorist ties" - and how they are propagated to law enforcement officers. 

These trainings have caught the eye of Senator Joe Lieberman, the chairman of the Senate's Homeland Security committee, and Senator Susan Collins, a ranking member. A March 29 letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano from the senators reads, in part:  "We are concerned with recent reports that state and local law enforcement agencies are being trained by individuals who not only do not understand the ideology of violent Islamist extremism but also cast aspersions on a wide swath of ordinary Americans merely because of their religious affiliation."  

How Your Tax Dollars Fuel The Hatred Of Muslims