On the July 7 edition of his Fox News show, Sean Hannity deceptively cropped President Obama's answer to a question from Fox News senior White House correspondent Major Garrett about the Cold War to suggest that Obama did not acknowledge the actions of past U.S. presidents in freeing Eastern Europe. In fact, as part of his answer, Obama stated, “I'm very proud of the traditions of Democratic and Republican presidents to lift the Iron Curtain,” a comment Hannity edited out of the clip he aired of Obama's response.

Hannity aired the following clip:

GARRETT: In your speech this morning, you said the Cold War reached its conclusion because of the actions of many nations over many years.

Mr. President, are the Russian sensitivities so fragile that you can't say the Cold War was won, the West won it, and it was led by a combination of Democratic and Republican American presidents?

OBAMA: There were a whole bunch of people throughout Eastern Europe who showed enormous courage, and I think that it is very important in this part of the world to acknowledge the degree to which people struggled for their own freedom.

We don't have to diminish other people in order to recognize our role in that history.

From Fox News' transcript of Obama's July 7 interview with Garrett, with the portions of Obama's answer Hannity omitted in bold:

GARRETT: In your speech this morning, you said the Cold War reached its conclusion because of the actions of many nations over many years. Mr. President, are the Russian sensitivities so fragile that you can't say the Cold War was won? The West won it? And it was led by a combination of Democratic and Republican American presidents?

OBAMA: Well, listen, the -- I think that you just cut out Lech Walesa and the Poles. You just cut out Havel and the Czechs. There were a whole bunch of people throughout Eastern Europe who showed enormous courage.

And I think that it is very important in this part of the world to acknowledge the degree to which people struggled for their own freedom. I'm very proud of the traditions of Democratic and Republican presidents to lift the Iron Curtain.

But, you know, we don't have to diminish other people in order to recognize our role in that history.

After airing the cropped clip, Hannity said:

HANNITY: Unbelievable. Now, that's interesting, because Lech Walesa, the leader of the Polish Solidarity Movement, said this about the end of the Cold War; he said, quote: “We in Poland took him, Ronald Reagan, so personally. Why? Because we owe him our liberty. Now this can't be said often enough by people who lived under oppression for half a century.”

Mr. President, if I were you, you may want to consider hitting the history books maybe before your next foreign trip.

Media Matters for America has documented a pattern by Hannity and other Fox News personalities of cropping Obama's comments abroad to misrepresent their meaning.

From the July 7 edition of Fox News' Hannity:

HANNITY: And tonight in “Hannity's America”: The president is in Russia, and, this morning, he sat down for an interview with our own Major Garrett. Now you won't believe his answer to Major's very first question.

[begin video clip]

GARRETT: In your speech this morning, you said the Cold War reached its conclusion because of the actions of many nations over many years.

Mr. President, are the Russian sensitivities so fragile that you can't say the Cold War was won, the West won it, and it was led by a combination of Democratic and Republican American presidents?

OBAMA: There were a whole bunch of people throughout Eastern Europe who showed enormous courage, and I think that it is very important in this part of the world to acknowledge the degree to which people struggled for their own freedom.

We don't have to diminish other people in order to recognize our role in that history.

[end video clip]

HANNITY: Unbelievable. Now, that's interesting, because Lech Walesa, the leader of the Polish Solidarity Movement, said this about the end of the Cold War; he said, quote: “We in Poland took him, Ronald Reagan, so personally. Why? Because we owe him our liberty. Now this can't be said often enough by people who lived under oppression for half a century.”

Mr. President, if I were you, you may want to consider hitting the history books maybe before your next foreign trip.