Baroness Thatcher has died

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22067155

Quote :

Former Prime Minister Baroness Thatcher has died at 87 following a stroke, her spokesman has said.

Lord Bell said: "It is with great sadness that Mark and Carol Thatcher announced that their mother Baroness Thatcher died peacefully following a stroke this morning."

Baroness Thatcher was Conservative prime minister from 1979 to 1990.

She was the first woman to hold the post. Her family is expected to make a further statement later.

Rest in peace, Iron Lady.

Just saw this. RIP.

One of an increasingly rare breed and perhaps the last 'genuine' Prime Minister Britain will know. RIP

RIP. A great human being who saved our country from ruin. Unfortunately, the proud hatred being let loose by the left is deeply disturbing.

RIP

It was quite amusing when she snubbed Sarah Palin's approach. Of course it would have been a travesty had she allowed such an intellectual light-weight into her circle.

The last British politician to have distinct beliefs and vision.

Whether one agreed with them was another matter.

Erica Ambler wrote:

The last British politician to have distinct beliefs and vision.

Whether one agreed with them was another matter.

You have to wonder what happened to the Tories to have gone from The Iron Lady to Cameron in just two decades.
Or would you just call that a symptom of a more general regression of civilization and society?

I would say it's to do with Britain surrendering its sovereignty to Brussels.

All important decisions affecting the UK are taken by the rest of the EU now, leaving highly paid British politicians to tinker with social engineering projects such as smoking, alcohol, gay marriage and fox hunting.

We leave the serious stuff like economics, energy and foreign affairs to people who know better such as Luxembourg and Croatia. (Looking forward to July.)

So ends the mother of parliaments. If there's anything to be said for Alzheimer's it's that Baroness Thatcher was probably unaware how bad things had got.

Erica Ambler wrote:

I would say it's to do with Britain surrendering its sovereignty to Brussels.

All important decisions affecting the UK are taken by the rest of the EU now, leaving highly paid British politicians to tinker with social engineering projects such as smoking, alcohol, gay marriage and fox hunting.

We leave the serious stuff like economics, energy and foreign affairs to people who know better such as Luxembourg and Croatia. (Looking forward to July.)

So ends the mother of parliaments. If there's anything to be said for Alzheimer's it's that Baroness Thatcher was probably unaware how bad things had got.

Are you saying that people like Maggie no longer bother with politics now, because there is little to be gained of true substance? Hence why the parties are now populated by second and third tier individuals instead?

To some extent, but I'm not sure people with such rigid beliefs even exist anymore.

One thing none of the obituaries seem to be touching on is the fact that she was the greatest woman leader in living memory. Thatcher and feminism always made awkward bedfellows.

Good summary of her life and times in the FT:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f76c049e-a042-11e2-a6e1-00144feabdc0.html#slide0

I wouldn't necessarily consider myself a feminist, but I certainly have a good deal of admiration for Thatcher.

I think the women's movement in general underestimates how much of its emancipation it owes to the (Christian) Right.

Erica Ambler wrote:

To some extent, but I'm not sure people with such rigid beliefs even exist anymore.

One thing none of the obituaries seem to be touching on is the fact that she was the greatest woman leader in living memory. Thatcher and feminism always made awkward bedfellows.

Good summary of her life and times in the FT:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f76c049e-a042-11e2-a6e1-00144feabdc0.html#slide0

Increasingly I would say that holding an earnest belief or indeed an understanding of a political philosophy is so much a secondary or even tertiary requirement these days that such people rarely get beyond an office role in their respective parties. Equally the traditional path to parliament used to be a progression built on experience and achievement in the public or private sector (better still both), but today we see party politics as a professional vocation in its own right, the door is not as welcoming to outsiders, when there is someone already in line waiting from the age of 15 etc as a result the people who end up running the country have less and less experience of it (or real life) in real terms.

ooi I saw an interview with Tony Benn a while back, who spoke of there being two types of politician, the signposts, and the weathercocks - the signposts believe in what they are saying and can be relied upon to point the same way, he respects those even when he disagree's with them (he cited Mrs Thatcher as an example), but the weathercock/weathervane just blows with the wind and cannot be respected for their beliefs because they don't really have any, he bemoaned that today's parliament is made up primarily of the latter group.

I would consider myself a feminist, at least in as much as I believe in meritocracy and equal opportunities.

Coming back on topic, one of the ironies of time is that Thatcher is now regarded as of the establishment, when it's hard to imagine more of an outsider in British politics than her, particularly compared to today's politicians who all have similar male/public school/Oxbridge-PPE backgrounds ,and espouse social democratic centrist policies. Which I suppose is what lachesis is saying.

Agree about Tony Benn. Saw him speak a few times and disagreed with much of what he said, but I never for a moment doubted his sincerity.

Standard of news coverage is very low. The Mirror thinks Thatcher has been given a state funeral, while the LA Times says she sank an Argentinean submarine 'drowning 368 soldiers'.

A loss indeed. Great admiration for this woman regardless of some of her actions. Someone said she had the clarity of vision and few if any will ever be like her. Cameron said she saved this country...aye, but he be destroying it.

RIP Lady Thatcher.

A sad day. One of the last great individualists in politics.

Violently disagree with the majority of her policies, but I respect her deep convictions, even if though she became increasingly blinkered and myopic in her final term (and seemed to resemble Gloriana in her identification with the state), as the early stages of the Alzheimer's kicked in.

RIP.

Well I despised the bitch and have been happily humming 'Ding dong the witch is dead' all day.

She destroyed any sense of community the country has, presided over the shameless selling of our utilities, and created a disgusting 'I'm alright Jack' mentality that had more or less destroyed anything great there ever was in Great Britain.

It really will be a cold day in hell cus the first thing the bitch will do is close the pits.

I've heard those sort of comments all day, Rave, generally from people who know nothing about industry or economics. You may dance on Thatcher's grave if you wish, but you're mistaken to say that she was wantonly destructive. The world was changing and Thatcher saw that earlier than any other Western leader. The UK may have lost many of its factories and pits, but a bit of context is necessary.

1. Deep coal mining has vanished from Western Europe as a whole not just in the UK- no one can make money from it against opencast mining in Asia and Africa. Besides which, coal burning on an industrial scale is prohibited by EU climate change legislation. Coal has no role in Britain's immediate future regardless of which party is in power. The pits would always have gone, though I accept that another government might have handled the closures more sensitively.

2. The same goes for manufacturing. The only area in which the West can compete is in high value-added and the UK continues to excel in those areas as witnessed by the world's second largest aerospace industry and some of the world's most research-intensive pharmaceutical companies. The small metal-bashing operations have gone from the UK for good, but they were never going to complete with an emergent China.

3. Such changes mean that anyone building a community around their work is misguided; no one is going to have a job for life now. Mobility and education is key to surviving nowadays. Better to face that than concern yourself with whether it's fair.

4. Start saving now. Government cannot be relied on to look after you. This year's ISA opened a few days ago.

5. Saying that caring for each other is what made Britain great is bullshit. You know full well that history is about warfare, risk-taking, technology, religion, culture and commerce. They're the reasons some nations succeed and others don't.

Well said, Ambler.

I love Rave, she's prettier than Mrs. Thatcher.

It was Santa wot made me say it.

Her and Oppers.

Erica Ambler wrote:

5. Saying that caring for each other is what made Britain great is bullshit.

No, obviously the opposite. But "caring for each other" or in other words - understanding how human interrelationships and power relations work, is something that made America from the 1870-1970s great. Something that Thatcher, Rand and Hayek never understood.

Largo's Shark wrote:

Erica Ambler wrote:

5. Saying that caring for each other is what made Britain great is bullshit.

No, obviously the opposite. But "caring for each other" or in other words - understanding how human interrelationships and power relations work, is something that made America from the 1870-1970s great. Something that Thatcher, Rand and Hayek never understood.

Would you elaborate on that, Oh Shark? Can't say I know what you're talking about.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Standard of news coverage is very low. The Mirror thinks Thatcher has been given a state funeral, while the LA Times says she sank an Argentinean submarine 'drowning 368 soldiers'.

If you were prowling on Santa's or Opper's neutral zones, you'd probably get torpedoed too.

Forgive me, Dog. Your arse reigns supreme.