BS: Thatcher speaks no more

Subject: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Cllr
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:22 PM

Baroness Thatcher retires from public speaking engagements The former Prime Minister, Baroness Thatcher, is to stop making public speeches, after a series of small strokes.

A statement issued by her office said:

"Over recent months, Lady Thatcher has suffered a number of small strokes. After thorough investigation involving a number of tests, her doctors have told her that these can neither be predicted nor prevented. They have therefore told her to cutback her programme at once, and in particular to avoid the undue strains that public speaking places on her. With great regret she has decided to abide by this advice and to cancel all her speaking engagements."

The Conservative Party Leader, Iain Duncan Smith, said he was saddened by the news, but fully understood the reasons that she had been advised to withdraw from her public engagements.

"On behalf of the whole party I wish her and Sir Denis the very best and our thoughts and wishes for a speedy recovery", he said.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,DEn
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:30 PM

Here's to the day when she won't be doing any speaking.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:31 PM

That's wishful thinking from you Cllr. I can understand why.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Chip
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:35 PM

Now lemme understand.........does that mean you're wishing her dead?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Cllr
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:43 PM

I don't, I just thought I would start this thread before someone else did. I'm off to a dinner tonight with Bernard Ingham as the guest speaker. Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Gareth
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:45 PM

Pity

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Cllr
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:51 PM

For our american friends, Bernard Ingham was Thatcher's press secretary for the period she was in power eleven years. One of his more famous quotes was "Blood sport is brought to its ultimate refinement in the gossip columns." If I may be as so bold as to paraphrase "Blood sport is brought to its ultimate refinement in the mudcat forum."Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Chip
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 01:56 PM

Cllr, my question was directed at DEn. Sorry that I wasn't clear. Now run along or you'll be late for dinner. :)

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,alistair now n Porto Alegre in the south of
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 02:02 PM

whooppeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee, have they started digging the grave yet?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: banjomad (inactive)
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 02:15 PM

thers is a god after all

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Gareth
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 02:16 PM

Digging the grave ? At a cross roads, with a sharp stake handy !

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Den
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 02:37 PM

Yeah Chip hope they're keeping a seat warm for her down below. Den

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 02:40 PM

Oh - it's true I see. I'd taken it as satire, in the wake of the way she's been carrying on lately. P>

I think the sooner she gets better, and the longer she keeps going, the more uncomfortable the poor old Official Tory Party headed by what's his name is going to be, and the happier the Provisional Tory Party headed by Tony Blair will be.

If anyone's got a stake ready for her it'll be someone theoretically on her own side. After all, they've already rehearsed that with her a few years back, haven't they?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Mr Red
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 03:05 PM

Well! I'm speechless!
at last!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Bert
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 03:15 PM

As much as I disagree with her politics I'm sorry to hear that she is sick.

Bert.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: DougR
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 05:30 PM

Bert, I always thought you were a man of class. That sentence is evidence of it, I think.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: alanabit
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 05:40 PM

I'll go along with that. Let's wish her back to quiet, reticent, good health.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 05:41 PM

That's taking it as face value, as really being true. That hadn't even occurred to me. I suppose it's quite possible it's not a convenient excuse. Possible.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Hrothgar
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 07:21 PM

She's still writing books. Best of all, she's still capable of putting the boot into the Conservative party. Now, that is fun to watch.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 08:05 PM

Whatever her other strengths and weaknesses, Thatcher has tarnished her own reputation with her petulant refusal to let go the reins. The more so, because she had been on the receiving end of similar crass behaviour from her own predecessor as Conservative leader, Ted Heath.

Nothwithstanding the example of Heath and Thatcher, it is not compulsory for Tories to behave like this. Witness William Hague and John Major, two thoroughly decent geezers, both of whom managed to hand over with dignity.

For Labour leaders, this seems to come naturally, as evidenced by Wilson, Callaghan and Kinnock. Which is strange, because I was brought up among Tories who believed that such qualities were a matter of breeding.

Cllr, your pathetic impressionability continues to amaze. (Splendid post on that theme, Chip.)

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: harvey andrews
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 08:19 PM

Just back from a gig to read this happy news, then I see a thread further down requesting the lyrics to "No grave can hold my body down".....scary eh!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: dagenham doc
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 08:28 PM

Oh you of short memory...I hope she rots.... slowly that is.

Doc

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Mark Cohen
Date: 22 Mar 02 - 10:02 PM

Alanabit, it's good to see that someone still knows the meaning of "reticent". These days, most people think it means "reluctant" ("reticent to speak" is the common phrase). Of course, pace Edwin Newman, that means that "reluctant" is on its way to being the "real" definition. Sic transit gloria linguae.

It's also interesting to watch this little bit of British political debate, an art that was in full flower when the U.S. was just a gleam in Leif Erickson's eye...

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: The Pooka
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 12:50 AM

Dr. Mark, you're right about "reticent" and the misusage-driven redefinition. And right again about British political debate. My my, rather rough-and-tumble there, gentlemen. Guess we're still a bit reticent over on this side of the pond...(or way out in the middle of the other pond, in Mark' case)...I think even most Reagan-haters don't celebrate the Alzheimers which afflicts Maggie's biggest U.S. admirer (though some might say, "How could they tell?")...Now *Nixon*, perhaps that's another matter...Mark I'd say you're wrong about Leif Erickson but I'm sure it was just a slip of the keyboard; you meant a twinkle in the eye of St. Brendan the Navigator :) / I don't like the Milk Snatcher either but I'll second Alanabit's quiet-good-health motion.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Lanfranc
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 03:42 AM

I, too, was struck with a wave of schadenfreude when I heard the news. Thatcher tacet - exultate!

Dubya is as bad, if not worse, than Thatcher - reactionary, bellicose, ignorant, etc. Just because he can't string two coherent sentences together doesn't mean that he's not dangerous!

Reagan was a joke, but there were constraints in his day that have since been removed. Dubya is, frankly, bloody terrifying, as far as I'm concerned, and, thanks to Blur, we're supposed to be on his side.

"Let's drop the big one, there'll be no-one left to blame us!" (Randy Newman, "Political Science")

Alan

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 04:52 AM

Bear in mind that this is the woman who: first came to our attention as Thatcher the milk snatcher when, as Minister for Education she deprived schoolchildrem of their free daily milk; started a pointless war in a misbegotten set of islands that none of us had ever heard of to take our minds off the political problems at home; oversaw the destruction of the British mining industry; oversaw the destruction of the British Trades Union movement; started the sell-off of Britain's nationalised industries for short-term gain (as Harold MacMillan put it 'selling off the family silver'); Inspired in Britain a me-first, get-rich-quick, screw everybody else, money-is-God culture;

Why on earth should anyone wish her ill?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Tam the bam fraeSaltcoatsScotland
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 10:11 AM

Great news isn't it.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Dead Horse
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 11:07 AM

I would guess that the official statement is to cover up the political gag that the party wishes to put on her ladyshit (oops, meant to put a "t", honest I did). That bitch will continue to haunt us all from the grave, so I'd rather she keep embarrassing the tories for years to come....lest we forget!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 11:07 AM

Pity it didn't happen 30 years ago!!I was rather hoping one of the strokes would finish her off permanently though!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Pict
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 12:00 PM

There will be tunes written in Scotland to celebrate the day of her death she was and is detested by the vast majority of Scots and with good reason any enmity directed towards her is thoroughly deserved she was a vile megalomaniac.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 01:28 PM

Insofar as there is blame for Thatcherism, that falls primarily on the people who voted for her, and the people who disagreed with her, but colluded with her for reasons of real-politik.

Including especially those who obstructed the kind of tactical voting and electoral reform which would have made it impossible for a minority backed extremism to rule the roost for so long.

Concentrating the hate on Thatcher is a bit like saying it's the fault of the cigarettes when you get lung-cancer, and ignoring the fact that it's only when you smoke them that they do you any harm.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Lanfranc
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 01:43 PM

I never voted for her, nor did I collude with her. I have always supported Proportional Representation.

I always loathed and despised her.

I'm beginning to feel very much the same way about Anthony Blair, which is worse, because I did vote for him first time round!

"Confound their politics, frustrate their knavish tricks" ("God Save the Queen")

Alan

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: JudeL
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 03:01 PM

Thanks Bullfrog, for putting it so succinctly. It is not just the anti-worker legislation or the "selling off the family silver" it's the underlying ideas that are so dangerous, such as the idea that letting profiteering private companies make money out of the old and the sick and only provide a minimalistic service is better, better for whom? Unfortunatly we are still living with her legacy of "society, there is no such thing as society" and after she was through brainwashing an entire generation beginning with what is taught in schools she was correct, having destroyed the spirit of community values that encouraged people to help each other. Ideas such as "casting bread upon the waters" and the parable of the good samaritan seem to have been largely replaced by "never give a sucker an even break" and "he/she/it was just asking for it".

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Wyrd Sister
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 03:09 PM

For this relief...

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 05:35 PM

McGrath, you're right that Thatcher couldn't have done this much harm if people hadn't voted for her in the first place. As to smoking, you're not quite right. There is at least one folksinger who's never smoked, but forty years of inhaling other people's smoke have permanently damaged his lungs.
Dead Horse, I don't believe it's a cover-up. If they couldn't silence her before, they couldn't now. She must have a very good reason. Maybe she's worse than they let on. Still, I wouldn't wish suffering on anybody - not even Mrs Thatcher!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Gareth
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 06:50 PM

Unfortunately this means the end of the old joke.

Dennis Thatcher dies - Were there any last words ? - No, she was with him to the end !

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 07:44 PM

The malice of the woman was beyond bounds.

She engineered a recession to enable her friends the rich to starve out the poor, and so beceome richer.

Deliberately.

I wish her a long illness with much pain.

Then I wish her a long time in hell.

As a piece of thread creep, if anyone has a better curse than that in Laszlo Feyer, let me know and I'll use it.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: The Pooka
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 11:06 PM

Jaysus. It's none o'me business & I been tryin' to stay out of it today, but: Order! Order! The House will be in Order! / Thank you. / Mr. Paddy Ashdown.

Susanne (skw), your sentiments are humane and comnpassionate. More so than many feel she deserves, obviously. This may reflect a cultural gap between the UK and Schleswig-Holstein; but I'm just guessing. / Order! Order! ....

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: banjomad (inactive)
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 02:50 AM

let us not forget, thatcher sent British soldiers to thier deaths to further her politcal ambitions. Feel no pity for this vile thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: C-flat
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 04:43 AM

C'mon you Guys..you're scaring me!!Thatchers politics may go against the grain of every right thinking person but to wish a slow,long suffering death upon her is perhaps going too far? The political pendulum was swinging hard to the right in the eighties, not just Thatcher. Those ballot boxes weren't rigged, the electorate gave Thatcher the go-ahead to behave the way she did! As for going to war to further her own ambitions, I'm getting a distinct feeling of deja vu with Blair! I certainly don't hold with what she did whilst in power but I'm not going to put the boot in now that she's sick. The time for that was 20 years ago! Unlike Tony Blair, you always new what Thatcher stood for and could vote against her! I voted for Blair thinking I new what HE stood for but I defy anyone to define New Labour's politics!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 08:04 AM

C-flat, you're dead right about Blair. But so is Richard Bridge about Thatcher.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 08:28 AM

As for wishing her a long painful illness befor death. I for one wholeheartedly support such a concept. She condemned thousands of elderly people in old folks homes by closing them down. The legacy of that act is unfortunately still with us years later as the so-called efficient PRIVATE ENTERPRISE old folks homes, which were supposed to cost the taxpayer less, have now screwed the system for every penny they could squeeze out of us and have decided that they can make more cash by turning 102 year people out on the street so that they can sell the buildings to property developers for demolition.
Care in the Community involved selling off psychiatric hospitals and care homes so that the mentally ill could be allowed the dignity of starving in cardboard boxes
Do we really need to list more reasons why she should burn in hell (Actually I do not believe in HELL, so could we just burn her here and now instead?).
Mind you Tony Blair had from his first day in office followed the teachings and policies of Margaret Thatcher, so I would be delighted if he could join her as quickly as possible in pain!
Not laughing!!!!!!
Geoff.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 08:54 AM

C-flat

The electorate didn't exactly give Mrs T the go-ahead - they just didn't stop her. The voting system meant she only needed 40% of the vote to have a massive Parliamentary majority, and she didn't really care about the other 60%. Tony Blair may be screwing things up but at least he tried to be a bit more inclusive than that.

Kitty

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 09:19 AM

Kitty, how do you work that out? The vote for Blair in 1997, which resulted in a parliamentary landslide, was smaller than that which gave John Major's Conservative government a narrow majority in 1992. That vote for Blair was in fact less than the vote for Clement Attlee in 1951, when the electorate was much smaller, and Attlee in fact lost. About the only thing to be said for the American college system is that it's less bad than the UK's.

And always remember that just before the last election, Blair refused repeated invitations by an interviewer, to see anything wrong in the gap between rich and poor continuing to widen. (Pre Thatcher, the biggest salaries were 30-40 times the average. By the time Blair was being grilled the biggest earners were on 200-300 times the average wage. And his first government had made no impression on child poverty, despite a manifesto promise to eradicate it within 20 years.

Blair is inclusive in the sense that his new chum Berlusconi in Italy is inclusive. You can be in his club, but you have to be rich.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: JudeL
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 09:25 AM

About that so called free choice to vote for her or not see my remarks about brainwashing, controlling what is taught in schools etc. There used to be a saying something about "give me a child until he's seven". Don't forget she's the one who pushed theough several laws curtailing the right of free speech (which incidentally have not been fully repealed) and advertising revenue is a strong motive to adjust the slant on what is broadcast or printed. It was also her lot who restricted university education to those who could afford it. If you have to work all hours just to be there it's fairly obvious this is going to affect how much attention and effort you can put into your course. Social work is currently in crisis partly because of chronic underfunding and partly because most of those who would previously have done the training who come from poorer backgrounds, that actually have an understanding of social problems faced by many in society, can't afford the training, so we are left with rich kids straght out of "daddy sponsored" uni who haven't a clue about what it really means to struggle to make ends meet. The same holds true for teachers, who now teach PSE (physical, social education) and which includes the party line on "social" issues. New Labour (otherwise known as Tories in disguise) are currently discussing including "citizenship" issues in the list of compulsory subjects. National Curriculum or National brainwashing. Lets not forget the highly discriminatory idea of having huge amounts of "to be done at home, without any supervision" coursework that is even a part of a Maths GCSE, coursework such as this reflects little of the ability of the child and more their social circumstances (do they have their own room, their own computer, parents who can afford to eat if at least one of them stays at home with the children). Given that in many (accademic) subjects the coursework represents 2/3 of the marks, it amazes me how little there is to ensure that what is handed in is only and entirely the child's own work. This system is not only discriminatory, but it devalues and undermines the validity of any couses passed. Is it any wonder that many companies are expecting prospective employees to prove in their own exam conditions that they are literate and numerate despite having "gcse" english and maths.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Hippie Chick
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 10:02 AM

From a politically less-ept American, to paraphrase, "from Tintagel to Orkney land, in every mine and mill, where working folks defend their rights, it's there you'll find Joe Hill, it's there you'll find Joe HIll."

"Don't Mourn, Organize!"

I don't follow news as I should, but surely if the views expressed herein are widely held over there, you can make the pendulum swing the other way. It has to sooner or later, and you can be part of the doing.

I perhaps am more idealist than realist, but but people like Thatcher and W didn't get where they are by their supporters being dis-organized. (or dis-organised)

HC, folkie from Ohio

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 10:56 AM

Fionn

I think the main problem might be that everyone is so disgusted with politics / politicians that they aren't turning out to vote. Who's left to vote for rather than against?

Kitty

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: DMcG
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 12:21 PM

Agreed Kitty. I was discussing this with my teenager sons today - both keen on history - and they felt that when both/all the main parties are considered unacceptable and/or unable to achieve you become very vulnerable to minor parties like the BNP gaining power. The elder pointed out that this is pretty much what happened to the Weimer Republic. Obviously that is a very extreme example, but the risk is there, as shown by Bradford

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 02:00 PM

I'm so fed up with all the Canadian mainstream parties that I won't vote for any of them, so it's happening here too. I like my local politicians far better (mayor, etc.). They don't belong to any party, and that's a darn good thing. They are free men and women, free to vote their conscience.

As for Maggie Thatcher, I detest her political attitude, but I'll have to go along with Bert on this one...I don't wish illness or death on anyone...not anymore. Such wishes have a way of coming back to haunt a person.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: JudeL
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 02:06 PM

Hippichick: you said don't mourn organise. That's very close to a phrase that I and other union stewards have been using "DON'T AGONISE - ORGANISE". We keep trying, and part of that is encouraging others to realise how deeply the change in culture has reached and to try to get others to remember the much maligned values of helping each other and doing things because they need doing rather than thinking of everything in terms of how much money is this going to make me. Selfishness has somehow become a virtue and helping others reviled as being a weak doormat. People tend to say I'm only one person , what difference does it make? And maybe, today, my choices, on their own may not do much, but the world is made up of individuals making choices and with enough people we can change the world, or a least a bit of it. Idealistic - undoubtedly, but if you don't try, you lose before you begin.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Gareth
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 04:36 PM

On the subject of Joe Hill that reminds me :-

I dreamt I saw Maggie last night,
As live as you or me,
They told me you were dead, I said,
I never died said she,
I never died said she.

They framed you at that conference Mag,
They said you had a stroke,
Was it just a rumour Mag,
Or a Duncan Smith sick joke,
A Duncan Smith sick joke.

From Enron's Hall to old Railtrack,
In closed down mine or mill.,
Where working folk all face the sack,
Maggie Thatcher lives on still,
Maggie Thatcher lives on still.

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 05:38 PM

Well, don't forget that they are all politicians. Politicians are all totaly barking mad. Who else but a mad person would believe that they can run a country? I suspect that they will all end their days in rooms that can only be opened from the outside.

But, I ask myself, what does that make of the rest of us? We vote for these loonies! They are all tarred with the same brush. They are all in it either for what they can get or due to some insane idea that they know better than the rest of us! I certainly concur that the Thatch was single handedly responsible for some of the worst political attrocities outside Uganda but every single man-jack of them does the same thing to a greater or lesser degree. No exceptions.

Don't vote for any of them. Show them that the whole system is wrong, corrupt, painfully flawed and inoperable. Lets go for self government. Anarchy in it's truest and purest sense. It can't be any worse than what we have.

Can it?

Cheers

Dave the Revolutionary

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: harvey andrews
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 05:44 PM

Sorry Dave. Read "Animal Farm" Somebody always ends up Leader. A vacuum always fills.The problem we have is that the apathy of voters due to broken promises and chicanery is creating a vacuum similar to that of the 30's and we all know who filled that don't we?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 08:22 PM

Well, self-government is a very good idea, in the sense of self-reliance, and I try to practice that. I am not so naive as to think that the government will solve all my problems or that the doctor will keep me healthy and long-lived or that some priest will manage my spiritual life for me. Nope, it's basically up to me.

Be that as it may, I'm still a democratic socialist, but there is no truly socialist party in Canada for whom I can vote. There used to be one, but they have turned into a pale remnant of what they once stood for.

I am fortunate, however, to live in a country where the government is only moderately bad much of the time, and not downright dangerous. Canada is a very moderate society as societies go, and I like it that way...even though it's a little unexciting. I do not fear my government, I just get irritated with them now and then.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 08:25 PM

This needed to be said. Thanks for reminding us, Harvey!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Greg F.
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 10:25 PM

Just give his handlers a chance & old George Dubya and the BuShites will make Thatcher look like a piker. U.S. voters have sadly learned absolutely nothing from the experiences of their cousins across the pond.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: alanabit
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 01:13 AM

It's a long time since anybody stood on (let alone stuck to) a set of principles which I could really support. For all of my voting life it has more been a case of trying to choose the lesser of two evils. The people who voted for "New Labour" and feel let down at least have cause for complaint. Those who sat on their backsides and risked a return to the eighties would do well to ponder over the fact that in most countries of this world, the ordinary citizens have even less say in their own destiny. Even in those countries which do stage elections, supporting the wrong party can mean risking your life.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 02:29 AM

Good------

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: JudeL
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 03:01 AM

You knew it was bad when choosing the monster raving loonie party was not just a protest vote

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: AKS
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 03:51 AM

If I remember it correctly, Thatcher and her disciples all over the world have been quite keen on the issue of fighting communism, and they still are - or am I mistaking? As we know the mission has been succesfull, at least to some extent. (I must admit that neither do I regret the fall of the Soviet Empire!)

What can not stop to astound me, however, is: why on earth are these same people so terribly eager, as they are, to restore the conditions that bred the radical communism (or bolshevism, rather) in the first place? Are these people simply being idiots or are they deliberately daring their extremes (as, eg, in benji-jumping and the like)!??

just wondering, AKS

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 04:43 AM

I was never keen on old Orwell - far too pesamistic. For a much better tretise on why we can never have the Utopian ideal is The Ragged Trousered Philantropist - The unabridged edition, not the selected highlights they fed us at school. Robert Tressel manages to fully convince you that a socialistic anarcic society is the ideal and in the last few pages explains why it can never happen. I'll not say any further in case you have not read it.

I do fully understand that and always have. The major point of my previous post is that, in my opinion, all politicians are the same. Even the ones who seem to genuinely want to help people are not a full shilling! It is a bit of a catch 22 but to want to govern a country, in my mind, should automaticaly disqualify the candidate on the grounds of mental instability.

I don't have the answer I'm afraid but I hope that if enough people realise that even a democracy has its flaws one of them will be clever enough to provide a better alternative:-)

Cheers

Dave the Gnome

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: InOBU
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 05:01 AM

Who needs Mad Maggie when you have the likes of this??? (this was sent to me in the email this morning...)
dear friends, Donald Rumsfeld is nuts, really and dangerously nuts. please spread this around. we've got to make some noise about this--hopefully Congress will get the message.

||| JOHN PILGER, MIRROR, LONDON - Donald Rumsfeld, the Defense Secretary, says he has told the Pentagon to "think the unthinkable." Vice President Dick Cheney, the voice of Bush, has said the US is considering military or other action against "40 to 50 countries" and warns that the new war may last 50 years or more. A Bush adviser, Richard Perle, explained. "(There will be) no stages," he said. "This is

total war. We are fighting a variety of enemies. There are lots of them out there . . . If we just let our vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely, and we don't try to piece together clever diplomacy but just wage a total war, our children will sing great songs about us years from now."

||| SCOTSMAN - Britain is ready to use its nuclear arsenal against any rogue state which deploys chemical or biological weapons on UK troops, Geoff Hoon, the Defense Secretary, warned. Mr Hoon raised further the tensions surrounding the imminent deployment of 1,700 British marines in

Afghanistan with his controversial comments, aimed at Iraq, Libya, Iran and North Korea. Echoing President Bush's recent approach, he suggested that they were four "countries of concern" which may not be deterred from unleashing weapons of mass destruction by the threat of a nuclear strike. Mr Hoon warned the defense committee in the House of Commons that these countries should be "absolutely confident" that Britain would

fire nuclear weapons on them if they deployed their own chemical or biological weapons. His comments exacerbated fears about prospective allied military action against Iraq.

MORE http://www.thescotsman.co.uk/index.cfm?id=309232002

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: The Walrus
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 05:34 AM

I would remind people that, when she stood for electiona for the first time as Tory leader, the Magatollah seemed no more radical than any other of her ilk, indeed, to my shame, it was the one time I voted Conservative (Well, remebering the "Winter of Discontent" she couldn't be any worse than the rest - WRONG!).
The problem was the "First Past the Post" system which gave her such a majority that, effectively, she became unstoppable and thus didn't seem to see a reason to stop - by the end of the first term, she believed her own B/S and was willing to do almost anything to stay.
As with some others here, I don't wish her ill health, indeed, I wish her a very long (and very quiet) retirement - Now, if there was only some way of removing all her assest so that she had to live on the state pension or in one of the nursing homes....

Walrus

I wonder if T.I.N.A. was a closet folkie? There is a verse from "Fine Old English Tory Times" which seens to sum up her manifesto:-

"The fine old days now come again
the cry runs through the land
In England there shall be dear bread
In Ireland, sword and brand
And poverty and ignorance shall swell the rich and grand
So rally round the ruler with the gentle iron hand
In the fine old English Tory times
Hail to the coming tide
In the fine old English Tory times
Hail to the coming tide..."

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,MC Fat
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 05:34 AM

Thatcher always called Scotland Disney land cos it Disnae Work and it Disnae Matter. This is truely a moment to 'rejoice rejoice'. May she spend her last days in a pit of horseshit with the occasional shout of 'Teabreak over, back on your head'

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Fiolar
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 06:09 AM

Continuing the thread - according to Iain Duncan Smith, the Tories are now "the champions of Britain's vulnerable people." What effing hypocritical b......t, when the creeps under Thatcher almost brought the Health Service to its knees, destroyed the coal industry, closed scores if not hundreds of factories and put thousands out of work. He must think people have selective amnesia. Martin Rowson's marvellous cartoon in today's Guardian sums it all up. Regarding Thatcher, some letters in the same paper are great. I quote: "Margaret Thatcher's doctors have ordered her to stop speaking in public. Where were they when we really needed then 30 odd years ago?" and "What terrible news. This means that the Tory party stands half a chance of becoming a credible party again." unquote.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Joe in the'pool
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 06:17 AM

Well I never.. I logged on to this site thinking, I wonder what all these people are about. Unseen faces, never heard thought's (well by me anyway) and here I am in the middle of a much welcomed political debate about the most reviled Prime Minister in living memory.

I make no apology for wishing her and her ilk, a long, lingering and painfull death. The suffering arising from her policies, with the full support of the civil service (who were aware of the likely outcomes of said policies) beggars belief in a so-called 'civilised society' towards it's people. With global politics on an unstoppable train (at the moment!) I look no further than my own community as to how we can all effect change. It's nothing new but it stops me from feeling powerless in a world where I was taught my vote counts! only to find all the parties are like a bag of wine gums, different colours but the same taste...

Vote 'nay no never no more... (well we'll see!)

Joe

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 06:23 AM

When a newly elected labour prime minister can invite Maggie to be his first guest at Number Ten, IDS turning into a one-nation Tory wet seems a small thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Pied Piper
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 06:24 AM

So the pompous old windbag is silenced,great news.I wrote a pipe tune a few years ago called "The hag behind the polltax" I think I'll give it an airing. PP

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 07:25 AM

Susanne - fair enough on the passive smoking.

Most of us had the political equivalent of passive smoking from Thatcher all those years, and never voted for her. The point remains though - it isn't the the monkey on the barrel organ we should be blaming, it's the people who voted the monkey into power. (Or more erspeciually the minority who kept voting her back once she'd shown what she stood for in practice.) And the people who obstructed attempts to get her out by tactical voting.

It's always a mistake to focus your energy on Yesterday's Enemy.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Ringer
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 07:42 AM

You make me ashamed to be a human being. How could you wish lingering death on anyone? With your poisonous spite, the venom and hatred you spew pollutes the Earth. Shame on you.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,MC Fat
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 07:59 AM

It's not about venomous hate. it's about level playing fields. Some of us are putting right the crap she shovelled at society. While her capitilist mates lined their pockets the rest of country suffered. Well now it's her turn.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 08:18 AM

I don't believe in wishing hate like that on anyone although I must admit I do find it hard to find sympathy for someone who seemed to be so cold hearted - seems to me like the people her polices hurt were just statistics in her games.

I do tend to agree with McGrath and the observation of someone else above. We did know what Thatcher was about and we as a country did allow her to remain in power for so long.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,melodymaker
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 08:41 AM

Maggie took away our milk. For that and terrorising innocent Irish folk and devastating the north of England, she can never be forgiven. DMcG - your son really has a point about the Weimer Republic!

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Joe in the'pool
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 08:59 AM

If people wishing a murderous (see falklands amongst many others) me and you Ron against the world Dictator, ill health, makes you ashamed to be human, then I for one am truly sorry that I offended you.

My intention was only to remember all those who have so needlessly lost their lives living in the ghetto's, she and her kind help to create, ensuring all her community live the fullest kind of life they desire.

Oh to find ONE! such committed person, with the POWER! to fight on behalf of the ghetto's, with such determination.

Joe

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Joe in the'pool
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 10:02 AM

During the fooball matches I used to attend some years ago there was a song made up, on the spot, by fellow supporters, when the lady herself was present at a Wembley Cup Final.

sung to 'Oh you lovely doll'

Oh you ugly doll you great big ugly doll let me put my arms around you throw you in river and *"*##g well drown you...

the lady never attended another!!

who said that community singing is dead...

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 12:03 PM

On the subject of passsive smoking and people losing their lives, didn't Mrst T take a million or two from one of the major tobacco companies (Philip Morris?) to help them open up the biggest market on earth, China?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: DougR
Date: 25 Mar 02 - 09:22 PM

Joe in the 'pool: you welome a "political debate?" How can it be a debate if only one point of view is being presented?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Terry K
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 03:57 AM

I certainly see lots of political stereotypes posting here but have to say I'm disappointed at the juvenile mean-mindedness of some who should know better.

Newton said that for every action there's an equal and opposite reaction. Mrs Thatcher succeeded because the stupid excesses of the trade unions created the need for someone like her. The majority that voted for her did so because of being totally pissed off by strikes and disruption. Most of the incredibly stupid union leaders were in themselves a good enough reason for the unions to be done away with.

Remember that Thatcher was only ever voted IN, never voted OUT so all the anti-Thatcher stuff in our democracy is a minority view.

And I'd hate to be a British person born and bred in the Falklands if some of you guys were running things. Whatever you think of the political juggling about the Falklands, the fact is that their country was INVADED by a FOREIGN power. Would you not want to be defended if you were in the same position?

Cheers, Terry

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 04:46 AM

Terry K, in the Falklands it is the UK that's a foreign country. The problem never arose when Labour was in power, because they sent gunboats to the region any time Argentina looked hostile. Thatcher preferred war, as evidenced in her gloating, almost hysterical, "just rejoice!" response to the Belgrano tragedy.

And since Thatcher was never supported by a majority of the electorate, how can you be sure that those who oppose her are "a minority view"? You may have noticed that even her own party has now unequivocally turned its back on Thatcherism. Playing to a majority view I would have thought.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Ringer
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 05:19 AM

I think rather that the problem never arose when Labour was in power, Fionn, simply because the problem never arose when Labour was in power. Argentina invaded the Falklands at that particular time because Gen Galtieri's (sp?) junta had domestic problems and he saw it as a way of deflecting public attention away from these. That the British Government apparently signalled a lessening interest in the region (by decommissioning a support ship, if my memory serves) was less evident then than hindsight makes evident now. But for you to claim "Thatcher preferred war" merely exhibits your prejudices.

And are you sure her "rejoice" response was to the Belgrano and not to news that Port Stanley had fallen?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Aldus
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 07:34 AM

I have not come to this forum for a very long time,and reading this thread reminds me why. I was never a fan of Mrs. Thatcher but the vitriolic ill will I see here makes me ashamed. She was a democratically elected leader with whom many of us disagreed but to wish her dead or incapcitated by serious illness makes me think that any leader is too good for people of that ilk. Shame on the lot of you.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Teribus
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 09:05 AM

To Guest Aldus - I can only say - VERY WELL SAID!!!! I agree with you entirely

To others I would say this:

To Guest melodymaker - The "...terrorising innocent Irish folk" was not done by Margaret Thatcher. Northern Ireland has been terrorised by small, entirely unrepresentative and wholely self-appointed groups who got the measure of the support they actually had from the Irish people in the all Ireland part of the referendum on the "Good Friday Agreement" (i.e. where about 90% of the voters told 'em to pack it in for good and all). The response to this was the Omagh Bomb - As I have said before, if any of them ever carried out the indiscriminate bombings killings and punishment beatings and then tried to tell me they were doing so to "protect" me - I'd tell 'em to bugger off and "protect" somebody else.

To Fion - Go ask the people who live in the Falklands under whose protection they would rather live. After all it is their lives and liberty that are at stake - not some lump of real estate. If your statement regarding the British being the foreigners in the Falklands is ever allowed by way of precedent - then there's quite a few Mudcatters around the globe had better start booking tickets home to the old country.

In a previous thread on Mudcat it was fairly well established that Mrs Thatcher did not start the Falklands War - That point was actually conceded in that thread by some of her more vociferous detractors when confronted by the facts very well put by others.

The post by Ringer quite rightly corrects you in that the "Rejoice, Rejoice" remark was made on the announcement that Port Stanley had fallen and that hostilities were at an end.

By the by, does anywhere in the UK hold a celebration of a Falklands Victory Day?? I don't think so. But in Argentina their military do celebrate the sinking of the Sheffield, Coventry and Atlantic Conveyor. We do not celebrate the sinking of the Belgrano.

Another point very well expressed by Terry K alluded to the state of the country before Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister - Again I have previously asked her detractors to tell us how wonderfull it all was? - To date no takers, because the country was in a complete and utter mess and the electorate of the UK were given the opportunity to vote and they did - whether you happened to like the result or not.

But with all threads associated with this lady, I am always amazed at the degree of tunnel visioned bigotry and the almost complete ignorance of, and unwillingness to acknowledge, the facts.

I am not advocating, nor ever had, that she always got it right - but then who ever does?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 10:58 AM

Not surprisingly, I agree with Teribus.Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: JudeL
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 11:10 AM

I don't wish her dead but I would like her to spend the rest of her life living on a state pension in a care home that has been tranferred to the private sector and is now run to make a profit instead of providing good quality service. & I hope she enjoys "happy shopper" orange squash and "conveyor belt" care from a succession of undertrained, overworked, staff earning the minimum wage and covering for the permanent unfillable vacancy rate of 28%.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 01:21 PM

What a pile a shite. Maggie did not wreck unions, unions did..who recall when you not go a mile on a train when all all hands went"for a tea Break". It was work one day, strike the next. For God's sake , some would strike if the staff room tea was cold. As for turning our society in a money grubbing one...where have you lot of nellies been the past three hundred years. Give us break, Maggie wasn't the problem. We were and we ain't fixed yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 01:59 PM

As has been pointed out there never was a majority of those who voted who voted for her. That's not unusual in our system - but normally governments elected on a minority vote have some kind of recognition of the fact, and don't pretend they've got popular backing for extremist policies. (Sometimes, as with this present shower they go too far in doing things designed to appeal to the people who voted against them.)

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 02:00 PM

(Another of these multi part threads, because the server seesm to have a short limit on threas size these days)There's a great myth about how terrible things were before 1979 - and the only thing I can say is that I was there, and it wasn't how it struck me. No time is perfect, but by and large that was a much better time for most of us than the next few years.

I remember the big poster the Tories had - "Labour's not working", all about how terrible it was that unemployment had reached 1 million. And they were quite right, one million unemployed was a terribly high figure, set against what we had been used to.

But within months of Thatcher coming in they went through the roof, and they stayed there for a generation. And for the next 20 years one million unemployed would have been a fantastically low figure.

There was a bunch of strikes in public services, and the clever label "winter of discontent" was coined. The effect was that for a few weeks public services fell to a level of squalor that was comparable to what became the normal state of affairs for the rest of the century.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 02:00 PM

The only thing that saved the first Thatcher government was the Falklands/Malvinas War. The Argentine generals who were in trouble were lured into staging a popular bit of adventurism.

And what lured them on was the way in which the Thatcher government had cut back and cut back on the British naval presence in the area, giving what was interpreted as a clear signal that possession of the islands was an embarrassment to Britain, and that there wouldn't be any serious opposition to a fait accompli occupation. Maybe it wasn't an intentional trap, just the unintended result of an in session with making cuts that went too far. Or maybe it was a calculated gamble that paid off.

In spite of which "I hate Maggie" thinking and posting is a waste of energy, and a diversion. It's very convenient for the politicians who are intent on screwing us today - either in the Official Tory party, or in Blair's unofficial Tory government.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 07:21 PM

Precisely McGrath. And Ringer, the point was well made at the time that Thatcher reduced UK naval presence in the area in the knowledge that this might provoke an Argentinian adventure. Do you think the UK foreign office was unaware of domestic politics in Argentina?

A quick check (as I should have done earlier) reveals that the "rejoice" episode was in response to UK helicopters attacking a different Argentine battleship, the Santa Fe (thereby paving the way for a land invasion). It was not in response to the Belgrano, but it was certainly not in response to the securing of overall victory either.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: gnu
Date: 26 Mar 02 - 07:52 PM

I know this is probably off the subject, and I apologize for not reading this entire thread, but I have been rather busy lately. May I enquire as to how many Victoria Crosses were ( 3, no ? ) issued in the Falklands and to whom ? Or, perhaps, where can I find this information ? I heard a story of an RSM who charged with sabre and pistol shortly before the final surrender, possibly causing the final surrender. Tis the stuff of legends, ere it were true. Of course, I saw the (obviously set up) picture of the single CPL (Lance, unpaid, acting) surveying 11,000 surrenders of weapons.

BTW, I must say that the British military performed in true fashion, becoming of their reputation as the world's most formidable foe. The fact that their foe was less than such does not dimish their achievement or their reputation. God save.

colonistgnu

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Terry K
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 02:29 AM

McGrath - almost every vote in our democracy is carried by a numerical minority of the whole electorate, but the fact remains that the winners get more of the votes than the losers. Whenever there is discussion about elections the losers always trot out the same tired old argument about numerical minorities. (I quite like the idea of The Apathy Party - to register your vote you simply don't turn up).

Jude L - people in this country do their best to ensure they have a comfortable life. What you seem to advocate is that anyone you don't like should not receive any benefit from their efforts - that's always been a pretty silly argument. And bear in mind that Thatcher has been out of power for a long time and the plight of the elderly poor is no better. Nor was it any better before she came to power.

and Fionn - you really need to get your facts right. UK is absolutely NOT a foreign power in the Falklands. You, from your distance, may feel it should be, but it is not, so the Falklands Islanders have an absolute right to expect us to repel invaders, just as do the people of the Isle of Wight. You might also check out the British in Gibralter as witnessed by the recent demonstrations.

Cheers, Terry

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 05:16 AM

I'll go you one better littlehawk, i detest all things british, including our common heritage.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,Teribus
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 06:06 AM

Fionn,

"A quick check (as I should have done earlier) reveals that the "rejoice" episode was in response to UK helicopters attacking a different Argentine battleship, the Santa Fe (thereby paving the way for a land invasion). "

The Argentinian submarine Santa Fe was attacked by the Lynx helicopter from HMS Brilliant. At the time the Santa Fe was bringing reinforcements to Grytviken in South Georgia. The submarine was damaged, not sunk, the attack alerted the Argentinians to a British presence and an extremely hurried attack had to be carried out before the men being brought in on the Santa Fe could be landed and deployed.

The subsequent attack was carried out by 45 men of the SAS and SBS, backed up by 60 Royal Marines from HMS Antrim. The task of retaking South Georgia had been allocated to 42 Commando's M Company. When South Georgia was re-taken M Company were still 200 miles away onboard RFA Tidespring.

That early on in the conflict I would doubt very much if Mrs Thatcher would have made the remark you ascribe to her over the damaging of of an Agentinian submarine - She might have made some comment regarding the recapture of South Georgia.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: JudeL
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 06:25 AM

On the contrary Terry, I believe that she should experience in full what she worked to create. It was her claim that privatisation would improve such services, instead her policies, which this current (labour in name only) government have continued, have caused serious underfunding and of what resources remain has siphoned so much money into private pockets that the services are on the point of collapse. Not content with that but what remains is under permanent threat of being reorganised into oblivion that what few staff are left are thoroughly demoralised. Privatisation in reality means fragmented and patchy services that the Local Authority "commissioner/purchaser" has very little control over and the client/user of the service even less. That 28% vacancy rate is a reality, as are attempts to recruit teachers and social workers from places like South Africa. Pay rates are so poor that in many cases they would earn more working on the checkouts at the local supermarket. When hospital cleaning services were directly provided, instead of contracted out to the lowest bidder, hospitals were kept spotless, cross infection rates were a fraction of what they are now. The cost of treating infections picked up in hospitals is now astronomical, far more than was saved by the short sighted penny pinching of contracting out. You are not the only one who remembers what things were like, and some of us remember being trained when the most important thing was providing excellent service rather than boosting shareholders profits.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Ringer
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 07:15 AM

Mrs Thatcher's "Rejoice" comment was made in the news briefing in response to the retaking of South Georgia (Click Here and scroll down to April 25th). That it came after British helicopters attacked an Argentine submarine is also true, but it is equally true that it came after she became Education Secretary, Prime Minister, etc. And it strikes me that after the retaking of SG, it was an entirely appropriate response.

But hatred rarely takes account of truth, does it?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 07:55 AM

"McGrath, almost every vote in our democracy is carried by a numerical minority of the whole electorate, but the fact remains that the winners get more of the votes than the losers."

That's what I meant when I wrote: "That's not unusual in our system", referring to the fact that Thatcher never had the support of more than a minority of voters.

However, as I then went on to say, most governments in practice recognise the implications of this, and limit the extent to which they impose their ideologically driven extremist policies.

And the reason I think it's important to point out the business about the actual voting proportions is that time after time it gets asserted that most people voted for Thatcher.

You get the same kind of distortion when people say in reference to Hitler that most Germans voted for him - they never did, but the politics of the time meant that it was possible for a politician with a sizeable minority vote to gain total power; and that does not mean I'm equating Thatcher with Hitler - but that's perhaps the most dramatic example of the way in which voters can achieve the last thing they want.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Fiolar
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 09:55 AM

A couple of points. With regard to hospital cleaning - when the service was removed from the control of the nursing management it started to go down hill. Mind you cleaning by staff other than nurses is a fairly recent innovation. By recent I mean in the last 35 years or so. When I started nursing in the mid fifties all cleaning (ward that is) was carried out by us nurses. I remember that the floor had to be washed at least once a week. As the majority of the wards had wooden floors, they were then allowed to dry and then wax polish was applied and buffed. Woe betide anyone if when the job was finished the nurse in charge couldn't see his face in the floor.
In regard to the Falklands, there used to be a rumour that some Argentine soldiers who had surrendered were shot out of hand. True or not, I don't know. But I wonder if the true story will ever be told. Thatcher is no hero of mine. She destroyed my beloved Health Service in which I spent practically all my working life.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 11:30 AM

Still - she was when in office a refreshing figure amongst so much stale crackers. And a great speaker. It is simply hateful to condenm the art of her persona which should be respected by all.

CB

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Fiolar
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 02:54 PM

I don't think she was a great speaker. According to the Guardian this week, her speeches were written and re-written time and time again and then this business of using "we" and the "third person" as in "the lady not for turning." She only appeared good because she terrified the rest of the characters in her cabinet.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 04:11 PM

Thatcher was not a good speech maker- as Fiolar says, she did go through a lot of rewrites to get speeches the way she wanted them and also she did have training in voice control and other speech techniques. But she was a great debator and much more at home in the exchanges at House of Commons. Kinnock delivered some great speeches but could not match up to Thatcher at the dispatch box. It was annouced today that she will still go to public meetings but Bernard Ingham will be delivering the speeches.Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 05:15 PM

That could really be a bit scarey. Him booming away, and Her glaring round, and fixing people with the glittering eye.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 05:34 PM

The woman cannot be defended. All that she did was motivated by malice. Her credo was oppression. She cynically undermined a (partly, at least) democratic system. She stole from the poor to give to the rich. Remember her words "There is no such thing as society". Vilification is the least she deserves. Anything I have wished upon her is not adequate, for there is nothing that could be.

Do not be ashamed of me. Be ashamed that you did not oppose her: her inhumanity; and be ashamed that we all did not rise in arms against her. Be ashamed that she survived to old age, in luxury, while those she dispossessed suffered in the poverty that she had caused, and caused only to make herself and her kind richer.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: DougR
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 08:14 PM

I dunno, Richard, it appears to me that Terry K., Ringer, Unidentified Guest on 3/26 at 01:21 P.M., Teribus and Guest Aldus have done a pretty good job of representing the minority view on this thread. And I've read all the posts.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 27 Mar 02 - 08:48 PM

Cllr (in a long-awaited return to the thread he started) is spot on with that observation about Thatcher v Kinnock. Without doubt Kinnock was a better speaker (on his day) and by miles. But in the cut and thrust of debate, Thatcher had his measure every time - even in the Westland debate, where Kinnock held all the cards. This cannot merely be about power. Blair is in power with a colossal majority, yet in Commons spats, William Hague invariably came out on top.

Fiolar, the "lady's not for turning" was of course a play on Christopher Fry's play, "The Lady's not for Burning."

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Fiolar
Date: 28 Mar 02 - 10:26 AM

I think it was the Gaurdian recently who compared her to "the ancient Mariner." Some of the lines in the poem could have been written specially for her. "The Wedding Guest he beat his breast,
Yet he cannot choose but hear;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright eyed mariner."

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Ringer
Date: 02 Apr 02 - 08:33 AM

Richard Bridge: it is evident from your post that you know a lot about malice. Nevertheless, I believe you to be mistaken.

In my experience (and it's a generalisation to which there are many honourable exceptions), those of the left suffer from an inability to attribute honest motives to those who may disagree with them. It's as though their point of view is somehow absolute and self-evident so that there can be no possibility of dissent; ergo, dissent must be motivated by malice. (As an aside, I point out that when such people get into power dissenters end up in gulags, as, entirely consistently, befits the malicious.) Again in my experience, this phenomenon is often accompanied by a complete failure of sense of humour.

In my opinion (and my point of view is contrary to yours), Mrs Thatcher's motives were not malicious. Unlike the current inhabitant of No 10, she was prepared to make, not just talk about, hard choices, and she put popularity low down on the priority list. One of the major criteria she used in making these choices was "What's good for Britain?". Certainly, people suffered as a result of her choices, but people (different people) would have suffered had she made different choices or none. Again, this is a generalisation, and it's likely that you can find exceptions.

If you admit that she often acted honestly according to her lights, you can still disagree with what she did, but at least you won't appear quite so dehumanising about her.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Apr 02 - 05:30 AM

No matter how strong you are, no matter how significant your achievements there comes a time for everybody when you have to let go and hand over to new people.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Apr 02 - 04:48 AM

It will be interesting to now "read what she has to say."

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Tam the bam fraeSaltcoatsScotland
Date: 06 Apr 02 - 05:04 AM

I agree with Richard Bridge and a so many million people in Scotland and Wales.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Terry K
Date: 06 Apr 02 - 01:10 PM

...then Tam, you and Richard and your million that you claim agree, ought all to grow up and stop paying lip-service to the kind of juvenile socialist rhetoric that every teenager spouted back in the sixties - an example from Richard " ...be ashamed that we all did not rise in arms against her ....". How utterly pathetic is that!!!

Cheers, Terry

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 10:08 AM

Any "word" from her lately?

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: GUEST,GrayD
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 05:18 PM

Note to Bullfrog Jones

Its going back up the thread a way but "the destruction of the British Trades Union movement"? How can I put this?

OI! BULLFROG! NO!

We're still here. We're still trying to represent our members' rights. We're still making a difference. We're just not making many headlines these days.

GrayD (just back from a very constructive meeting with management in a VERY big company)

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 05:59 PM

Myself, I always thought that William Hague looked like a pompous buffoon in his sparring matches with Blair. Blair came across as a drip, of course; but if anyone came off worse in the exchanges, I think it tended to be Hague.

I know the pundits in the media were prone to put it the other way - but why should I give any more weight to their views than I do to mine, when we'd both been watching the same drab soap opera on the TV?

Mr IDS on the other hand does surprisingly well. Far better than his predecessor.

Applying the "who would you want for a next door neighbour" test, I think I'd sooner have IDS than Tony. Sooner have Ken Livingstone of course. Or Ann Widdecombe for that matter. And if it was Thatcher I'd move. What a horrible thought...

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Gareth
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 06:50 PM

Kevin _ I take it will be McGrath of the Hebrides next ! Is that far enuf away ???

Small prediction while that woman and her clones exist we will never foget here in Wales.

And as for the "Thatcher Foundation" well long may she suffer from piles !

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:20 PM

GrayD -- Thank you. I'm happy to stand corrected. Good luck in your negotiations.

Subject: RE: BS: Thatcher speaks no more
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Apr 02 - 08:35 PM

One good thing about Harlow - and there are quite a lot - is that never in a million years would she stay here longer than she had to.

She came here once to a factory on the quiet, but it didn't stay quiet for long, because people were phoning each other up to come and boo her from across the road and there was a fair turnout within half an hour, and she had to get out the back way. And that was before mobile phones.