I can't imagine the outcry that would happen if Biden issued an order like this, yet I'm sure it'll either be silence or cheers from the MAGA crowd. This is scary stuff, trying to regulate the contents of museums I can't help but feel is straight out of certain unsavory historical figures' playoffs. The people being called chicken little when they said Trump would be authoritarian to an unseen degree in our history probably feel some grim satisfaction at this. More on reddit.com

I go to the museum fairly often (I live nearby) and I do enjoy it. It has an interesting cross-section of American history and culture, and the exhibits are written for a slightly more educated audience than, say, the Natural History Museum exhibits, which seem to be mostly pitched at children. And it is less laudatory of American military activity than Air and Space. But I don't take it to be anything like a representation of American history as a whole, or even a popular representation of American history. It's entertainment. Better than some, worse than others. There are severe limitations on what the museum can do because it is part of the Smithsonian Institution and is as such an "official" presentation of the U.S. government, and reliant on Congressional funding. There was a time, some 20-30 years ago or so at this point, when the Smithsonian was considered a place where fairly cutting edge and probing exhibits could be done. This is no longer the case. Anything that has the slightest odor of political controversy is watered down significantly. To put it another way, the official motto of the Smithsonian used to be "America's Attic." OK, that's not great. It evokes antiquarianism (the past for the past's sake), but at least it is neutral about the contents of the attic. Today the official motto is: "Seriously Amazing." Seriously. Which is a very different sort of modus operandi — it is celebratory in nature. I know many present and past curators at that museum and the other museums in the Smithsonian Institution, and have participated in discussions about what it would require to create an exhibit that would be "allowed" to run at an SI museum (on the Manhattan Project), and the most common sentiment expressed is some degree of dissatisfaction with the museum side of the operation. (There is also a research and preservation side, which is a totally different world, even though it takes place in the same buildings as the museum, tucked away where you can't go normally.) The sentiment ranges from the "well, this is what we have to do, because we're a public institution, and we do manage to slip in some thoughtful things despite the limitations" to "most of the things on display are either meaningless or misleading." So I would bear these political considerations in mind when thinking about what the exhibits reflect about the United States. They don't reflect our history, so to speak. What they reflect is the political considerations involved in displaying history under an official aegis under the climate of the last 20-30 years or so. The Enola Gay controversy in 1994-95 is seen as one of the main catalysts in this — the curators involved in that were genuinely shocked to find that their curatorial judgment and expertise was suddenly under heavy Congressional scrutiny. Because it is an official institution, the SI is desperately eager to avoid becoming some kind of participant in the violent political football which has defined Washington since the Clinton years. More on reddit.com

Trump just randomly decided that the Smithsonian is part of the federal government and the news media seems to be happily going along with it, apparently More on reddit.com

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