"Imagine a place where a government, apparently stung by the criticism of a vibrant and sometimes sassy local press, moves not just to restrict what might be legally published about the government but also prosecutes a journalist who has leveled some of the attacks.

Sounds like something you'd expect in some autocratic Third World country, right? It's certainly nothing you'd find here in the United States, at a time when a fresh Obama administration is promising a new era of transparency in government, right?

Wrong.

In fact, right here in Connecticut, the Mohegan Tribal Council is pursuing a “good standing” complaint against a tribal member for things he has posted on his Web site, brokenwingeditorials.blogspot.com, according to another Web site that publishes news of the tribe, feathernews.blogspot.com.

The tribal council has also just passed a new Freedom of Information law, one the brokenwing blog facetiously calls the “Restriction of Information Ordinance,” which makes it unlawful for tribal members to make tribal records public."

Get the Story:
David Collins: Mohegans Clamping Down On The Press (The New London Day 1/25)