Analysis of the death of Queen Elizabeth II in a Washington Post column has angered a former aide to Margaret Thatcher.
The Karen Attiah column was titled, "We must speak the ugly truths about Queen Elizabeth and Britain's empire."
"In the wake of the queen’s death, propaganda, fantasy and ignorance are being pitted against Britain’s historical record and the lived experience of Africans, Asians, Middle Easterners, the Irish and others," Attiah wrote. "Hagiography of Queen Elizabeth and the fading British Empire obscures the truth not only about Britain but also about our current world order, which is built on that history. We can speak the truth about that history even as we pause to wish her spirit and her family well during this transition. And then we must get back to work — to dismantle the present-day vestiges of the racist, colonial empire she so dutifully represented."
Former Thatcher aide Nile Gardiner took offense.
"An ugly, nasty attack on the Queen and Great Britain from the ignorant woke American far-left," Gardiner wrote.
"The Washington Post and The New York Times publish an awful lot of sneering anti-British rubbish on their pages.