Ministry of Truth

Snagged this from the Center For American Progress. After I googled Smithsonian Showtime, I see it's been out there. I just recently have lagged behind in reading the Washington Post and the New York Times "top 20" most e-mailed articles, but I see they've reported on it. Anyway, here is the post that caught my eye:

CULTURE -- THE SMITHSONIAN SELLS OUT TO SHOWTIME: Last month the cash-strapped Smithsonian Institution entered into a private contract with Showtime Networks to create Smithsonian Networks, a new television network. "As part of the deal, Smithsonian Networks was to get the right of first refusal on commercial documentaries that relied significantly on the museum's archives, curators or scientists." In other words, filmmakers and historians who want to use Smithsonian materials could be blocked if Showtime executives say so.

PBS documentarian Ken Burns called the policy "terrifying," and said it "would have prohibited him from making some of his recent works." More than 200 filmmakers, television executives, and academics have signed a letter to Smithsonian Secretary Lawrence Small, asking the Smithsonian to annul the contract and hold public hearings. The Center for American Progress has also filed a Freedom of Information Act request asking that the contract be brought into the public eye. "I was horrified that the Smithsonian would even contemplate a deal that would give a for-profit broadcaster the right of first refusal," said Nina Gilden Seavey, an Emmy-winning filmmaker and director of the Documentary Center at George Washington University. "It is a fire sale of the nation's history."

Which, incidentally, the taxpayers paid to attain and preserve as a common public inheritance.

http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/004531.php

Read more at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is on the right side in the fight against the tidal wave of thought repression that is coming our way. The first amendment is under attack by our elite corporate rulers, and the right of every citizen to know the truth is a critical component of speaking the truth.