# Trump does something right. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 22, 2017, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816 "2017-01-22T11:29:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/1 "2017-01-22T11:29:46Z")
Shock! Horror! Hold the presses! Trump has actually done something right! Obama [removed](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=509589) the bust of Winston Churchill from the White House, sending it back to the British Embassy. This was NOT well received over here (and remember that Chruchill was an honorary American citizen, and his mother was American). Trump is [putting it back](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-inauguration-winston-churchill-bust-returned-oval-office-white-house-a7538806.html). ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/2 "2017-01-22T11:47:23Z")
I do not think removing MLK from the Oval Office on Day One can be classified as “doing something right.” IMHO it was a dumb move handled in a clumsy way by what promises to be a clumsy, no-class administration. ---
**Author:** ![RobDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f07891/32.png) [@RobDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobDog)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/3 "2017-01-22T11:56:01Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Shock! Horror! Hold the presses! Trump has actually done something right! > > Obama [removed](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=509589) the bust of Winston Churchill from the White House, sending it back to the British Embassy. **This was NOT well received over here** … (Bolding mine) Really? To what degree though? I don’t remember this being reported or commented upon in the UK at the time, and I’m having trouble finding any major contemporary reportage of that incident via Google (although of course I’m willing to accept that’s a failure on my part.) ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/4 "2017-01-22T12:29:13Z")
Google is failing me too, but I’m British and I remember it well enough at the time. ---
**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/5 "2017-01-22T12:31:53Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Shock! Horror! Hold the presses! Trump has actually done something right! > > Obama [removed](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=509589) the bust of Winston Churchill from the White House, sending it back to the British Embassy. First, let’s get the facts straight. He moved the bust to another part of the White House, to make room for a Martin Luther King bust. [A factual explanation:](http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/president-obama-explains-winston-churchills-bust-removed-oval/story?id=38602120) The president explained that the bust is placed outside his private office in the White House residence, known as the Treaty Room, where he sees it "every day, including on weekends, when I’m going into that office to watch a basketball game.” It was long rumored that Obama had sent the bust back to the British Embassy after removing it from the Oval Office. He went on to explain that “as the first African-American president” he thought it appropriate to put a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. in the Oval Office, noting that there are “only so many tables where you can put busts, otherwise it starts looking a little cluttered.” ---
**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/6 "2017-01-22T12:38:02Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > I do not think removing MLK from the Oval Office on Day One can be classified as “doing something right.” IMHO it was a dumb move handled in a clumsy way by what promises to be a clumsy, no-class administration. [This is also incorrect:](http://dailycaller.com/2017/01/21/trump-calls-out-time-magazine-for-fake-news-story-about-removing-mlk-bust-from-oval-office/) “Trump said the reporter, Zeke Miller, couldn’t see the bust because a camera man was standing in front of it and immediately assumed it had been removed.” (Miller later apologized) ---
**Author:** ![RobDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f07891/32.png) [@RobDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobDog)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/7 "2017-01-22T12:40:31Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Google is failing me too, but I’m British and I remember it well enough at the time. Well in that case I’m going to file it under “barely noticed storm in a teeny tiny teacup”. ---
**Author:** ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/8 "2017-01-22T14:54:34Z")
> [@RobDog](#): > > (Bolding mine) > > Really? To what degree though? I don’t remember this being reported or commented upon in the UK at the time, and I’m having trouble finding any major contemporary reportage of that incident via Google (although of course I’m willing to accept that’s a failure on my part.) I’m an American, and I remember very well that a lot of British commentators were outraged by it. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/9 "2017-01-22T15:07:46Z")
> [@Flyer](#): > > I’m an American, and I remember very well that a lot of British commentators were outraged by it. “Telling Americans what to do” seems to be the entire reason for British commentators’ existence. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/10 "2017-01-22T15:10:47Z")
> [@whitetho](#): > > [This is also incorrect:](http://dailycaller.com/2017/01/21/trump-calls-out-time-magazine-for-fake-news-story-about-removing-mlk-bust-from-oval-office/) “Trump said the reporter, Zeke Miller, couldn’t see the bust because a camera man was standing in front of it and immediately assumed it had been removed.” (Miller later apologized) Thanks for clearing that up. ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/11 "2017-01-22T16:48:16Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > “Telling Americans what to do” seems to be the entire reason for British commentators’ existence. That colonial mindset dies hard when they see their unearned power slipping further and further from their grasp and they have to shore up their own economy by their own means - no serfs or slaves or criminals to work for a pittance. No wonder they’re so pissed at people coming to work on their soil, only \*they \*get to profit off doing that to other countries! ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/12 "2017-01-22T17:07:00Z")
Fact check: The White House curator’s office did return a bust of Churchill to the British government, but it was not the original bust on display in the White House. There were two busts. The idea that it was a snub to the British is a complete urban legend. > [@](#): > > The White House has had a bust of Winston Churchill since the 1960’s. At the start of the Bush administration Prime Minister Blair lent President Bush a bust that matched the one in the White House, which was being worked on at the time and was later returned to the residence. The version lent by Prime Minister Blair was displayed by President Bush until the end of his Presidency. On January 20, 2009 – Inauguration Day – all of the art lent specifically for President Bush’s Oval Office was removed by the curator’s office, as is common practice at the end of every presidency. The original Churchill bust remained on display in the residence. The idea put forward by Charles Krauthammer and others that President Obama returned the Churchill bust or refused to display the bust because of antipathy towards the British is completely false and an urban legend that continues to circulate to this day. > **[Fact Check: The Bust of Winston Churchill](https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2012/07/27/fact-check-bust-winston-churchill)** > > The bust of Winston Churchill has a prominent place in the White House -- in the Residence, outside the Treaty Room. It looks like you were taken in, **Quartz**. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/13 "2017-01-22T17:51:12Z")
> [@Flyer](#): > > I’m an American, and I remember very well that a lot of British commentators were outraged by it. Your concern about what foreign commentators think, even about untrue things, is to be commended. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/14 "2017-01-22T18:10:32Z")
> [@Flyer](#): > > I’m an American, and I remember very well that a lot of British commentators were outraged by it. No, you remember the right-wing media industrial complex telling you that the Brits were outraged. What you don’t remember is that nothing of the sort actually happened, and that it was a made-up story. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/15 "2017-01-22T18:51:51Z")
> [@cochrane](#): > > Fact check: The White House curator’s office did return a bust of Churchill to the British government, but it was not the original bust on display in the White House. There were two busts. The idea that it was a snub to the British is a complete urban legend. If Churchill is involved, I believe it qualifies as an urbane legend. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/16 "2017-01-22T19:24:10Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Shock! Horror! Hold the presses! Trump has actually done something right! While I recognize Churchill’s historical significance, exactly why should his bust be in the Oval Office in preference to any other possible choices? Is there a bust of FDR on display at 10 Downing Street? ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/17 "2017-01-22T19:36:29Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > I do not think removing MLK from the Oval Office on Day One can be classified as “doing something right.” IMHO it was a dumb move handled in a clumsy way by what promises to be a clumsy, no-class administration. I’m startin’ to think you don’t care for Trump much, do ya? ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/18 "2017-01-22T19:40:27Z")
Sad. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/19 "2017-01-22T19:50:29Z")
Whether or not British officials cared all that much, the British press had a field day with it. Although it turns out that Churchill got replaced with Abraham Lincoln, not MLK. _“The bronze by Sir Jacob Epstein, worth hundreds of thousands of pounds if it were ever sold on the open market, enjoyed pride of place in the Oval Office during President Bush’s tenure. But when British officials offered to let Mr Obama to hang onto the bust for a further four years, the White House said: “Thanks, but no thanks.”… American politicians have made quoting Churchill, whose mother was American, something of an art form, but not Mr Obama, who prefers to cite the words and works of his hero Abraham Lincoln. Indeed a bust of Mr Lincoln now sits in the Oval Office where Epstein’s Churchill once ruled the roost… Churchill has less happy connotations for Mr Obama than those American politicians who celebrate his wartime leadership. It was during Churchill’s second premiership that Britain suppressed Kenya’s Mau Mau rebellion. Among Kenyans allegedly tortured by the colonial regime included one Hussein Onyango Obama, the President’s grandfather. The rejection of the bust has left some British officials nervously reading the runes to see how much influence the UK can wield with the new regime in Washington.”_ > **[Barack Obama sends bust of Winston Churchill on its way back to Britain](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/4623148/Barack-Obama-sends-bust-of-Winston-Churchill-on-its-way-back-to-Britain.html)** > > Barack Obama has sent Sir Winston Churchill packing and pulse rates soaring among anxious British diplomats. Nice to see that during the final days of their tenure, Barack and Michelle apparently didn’t load up moving vans full of White House furniture and artifacts for their personal use. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2017, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816/20 "2017-01-22T20:03:18Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Whether or not British officials cared all that much, the British press had a field day with it. > > Although it turns out that Churchill got replaced with Abraham Lincoln, not MLK. > > _“The bronze by Sir Jacob Epstein, worth hundreds of thousands of pounds if it were ever sold on the open market, enjoyed pride of place in the Oval Office during President Bush’s tenure. > But when British officials offered to let Mr Obama to hang onto the bust for a further four years, the White House said: “Thanks, but no thanks.”… > American politicians have made quoting Churchill, whose mother was American, something of an art form, but not Mr Obama, who prefers to cite the words and works of his hero Abraham Lincoln. Indeed a bust of Mr Lincoln now sits in the Oval Office where Epstein’s Churchill once ruled the roost… > Churchill has less happy connotations for Mr Obama than those American politicians who celebrate his wartime leadership. It was during Churchill’s second premiership that Britain suppressed Kenya’s Mau Mau rebellion. Among Kenyans allegedly tortured by the colonial regime included one Hussein Onyango Obama, the President’s grandfather. > The rejection of the bust has left some British officials nervously reading the runes to see how much influence the UK can wield with the new regime in Washington.”_ > > [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/4623148/Barack-Obama-sends-bust-of-Winston-Churchill-on-its-way-back-to-Britain.html](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/4623148/Barack-Obama-sends-bust-of-Winston-Churchill-on-its-way-back-to-Britain.html) > > Nice to see that during the final days of their tenure, Barack and Michelle apparently didn’t load up moving vans full of White House furniture and artifacts for their personal use. Yes, but that was the second bust, which was loaned to George W. Bush in 2001, not the original one, which has been in the White House since the 1960s. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trump-does-something-right/777816.md?page=2)