In a May 18 MRC Culture & Media Institute article that’s more agitprop than “research,” Matt Philbin peddles one false or misleading claim after another to whine that “the broadcast networks have mostly ignored, and major newspapers have excused or minimized, [President Obama’s] slights to America’s unambiguous friends.” Here’s the most egregious one:
“Throwing Churchill out of the Oval Office” – “It is hard to think of a more derogatory message to send to the British people within days of taking office than to fling a bust of Winston Churchill out of the Oval Office and send it packing back to the British Embassy,” Gardiner wrote, “not least as it was a loaned gift from Britain to the United States as a powerful display of solidarity in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.”
ABC, CBS and NBC all ignored the offending gesture. U.S. newspapers noted it – in some case because readers had written in to ask about the story they’d heard second hand. If it bothered the papers, they didn’t say so.
What Philbin doesn’t tell you: The networks ignored the story because it isn’t true.
The British Embassy has confirmed that the bust was “uniquely lent” to Bush, and was scheduled to be returned at the end of Bush’s term — as reported in the UK Telegraph story to which Philbin himself links to back up his claim.
We thought Philbin’s employer was the Media Research Center, not the Media Conspiracy Theory Promotion Center.