The Lady's not for turning !!!

[DodgyAgent]

Welcome to the retrospective party political broadcast for the Conservative Party.

You forgot a few things

Do you remember 3.5 million on the dole?
Do you remember her being very unpopular and almost losing her first election to the worst labour leader ever?
Do you remember scraping the student loan?
Do you remember her being very unpopular with her own party and being ousted?
Do you remember the house price crash and the reposessions?
So you remember double digit interest rates?
Do you remember the sinking of the general Belgrano when it was outside the exclusion zone?
Do you remember selling arms to Sadam Hussain?
Do you remember the support to mass murder Pinochet?

Oh dear

Back to meaningless Cliches again

[Bagpuss]

Oh dear

Back to meaningless Cliches again

Go on then if you must, I'll stick to reality

[Lucy]

Welcome to the retrospective party political broadcast for the Conservative Party.

You forgot a few things

Do you remember 3.5 million on the dole?
Do you remember her being very unpopular and almost losing her first election to the worst labour leader ever?
Do you remember scraping the student loan?
Do you remember her being very unpopular with her own party and being ousted?
Do you remember the house price crash and the reposessions?
So you remember double digit interest rates?
Do you remember the sinking of the general Belgrano when it was outside the exclusion zone?
Do you remember selling arms to Sadam Hussain?
Do you remember the support to mass murderer Pinochet?

No leader is without fault, and if you understood realpolitik you would know this.

But what you seem incapable of answering is- how did you suffer? & how are you 'suffering now'?

[Peoplesoft bloke]

......
. She lowered tax and removed red tape,....

Er no, she didn't. She increased taxes (VAT for example) both in scope and reach for all except the rich - fair enough if that's what you want (and a policy Gordo seems to be following).

As for the idea she cut red tape - eh?

She pretty much invented the QUANGO and expanded the Civil Service.

[DodgyAgent]

Er no, she didn't. She increased taxes (VAT for example) both in scope and reach for all except the rich - fair enough if that's what you want (and a policy Gordo seems to be following).

As for the idea she cut red tape - eh?

She pretty much invented the QUANGO and expanded the Civil Service.

Pick, pick,pick,pick. You are clutching at the little things in a pathetic attempt to put some meaning on your contempt. If her policies on denationalisation and the Unions were wrong than have the guts to argue them. The "little" bits and pieces that you so sadly cling to are irrelevant.

Anyway money in the hands of the rich is better spent by them than it is by govt.

[lilelvis2000]

At last. You may have a point about rail nationalisation but you dont seem capable of arguing a point. For instance you are using throw away lines (if you pardon the pun). Are you saying that the rail system would be better off if it was owned by the state? if so how? remember the rail network gets far more use today than it did under and before Thatcher. Is that because the (privatised" rail network has been so successfull that it has attracted more people to use it?

Remember the population is significantly higher now than when rail was first privitised. Its also a whole heck of a lot more expensive! A lot of people use it just out of necessity rather than want. I don't think the rail network is currently a success in England at all. Would it be worse under government control? Probably as the profits would not be re-invested.

[Bagpuss]

No leader is without fault, and if you understood realpolitik you would know this.

Realpolitik "Poloitcs or diplomacy based primarily on practical considerations, rather than ideological notions"

You do make me laugh, explain how monterism isn't a ideological notion?

Lucy, how can you be so patronising when you clearly don't understand what you are talking about

[Lucy]

Realpolitik "Poloitcs or diplomacy based primarily on practical considerations, rather than ideological notions"

You do make me laugh, explain how monterism isn't a ideological notion?

Lucy, try not to be so patronising when you don't wvwn understand what you are tlaking about

As always, you've missed the point completely.

(You'd better go, it's almost time for Eggheads!)

[Board Game Geek]

Do you remember 3.5 million on the dole?

Yes. And there are millions of people unemployed today as well.

Do you remember her being very unpopular and almost losing her first election to the worst labour leader ever?

Nope. If that's true, I suspect it was because she was a woman and the old boy network were a bit jittery about a female PM for the first time.

Do you remember scraping(sic) the student loan?

Yes. Can't say I was impressed either.

Do you remember her being very unpopular with her own party and being ousted?

Politics is all about succession, and there are always wolves panting at the door, biding their time. It's natural in their game.

Do you remember the house price crash and the reposessions?

Yes. I also remember people who got on to the ladder for the first time and exercised prudence and caution and rode out the crash and repossessions.

So you remember double digit interest rates?

Yes. And we'll have then again one day under this government or the next, and it probably won't be the fault of the government, but of the banks and the financial greed of companies. Everything goes round full circle.

Do you remember the sinking of the general Belgrano when it was outside the exclusion zone?

Actually, I didn't know that story about the exclusion zone. Not that it matters to me anyway. It's war and we're fighting to win. All bets are off.

Do you remember selling arms to Sadam Hussain?

Nope. Not me Guv...oh I see...

Yes. The benefit of hindsight eh ? At the time however....

Do you remember the support to mass murder Pinochet?

Support ? In what way ? I knew there was a relationship between both countries, but I'm not aware of the level of support offered. Is it the same level of support enjoyed between the Labour-UK and Rhodesia and Mugabe ?

If so, then that's hardly a "Maggie" foible. More like a "Government Foible" practiced by any incumbent government, so it seems.

How do you "mass murder" someone anyway ?

[Peoplesoft bloke]

What is interesting is how totally polarised people are in their view on Thatcher. Whilst the traditional lefties will never accept what she did, it is the middle classes who present the most fascinating insight on how people's minds think.

On the one hand we have those that accept what Thatcher did as being somewhere between necessity and "should still be PM today", and on the other hand we have those middle classes who have clearly benefitted from her reforms yet so hate her (the word I think is hypocrite).

None of these Thatcher "haters" will present a coherent salient end to end argument that explains why we would have been better off without her. These people instead pick up on the weaknesses of her regime (of which there were many- even though they were also irrelevant in the grand scheme of what she achieved), and the fallout effect of her policies.

Most of us who enjoy life working in an economy with relative freedom realise that the true damage to society and the economy was not dished out by Thatcher, but was done in the preceeeding years of her regime.

is it an intelligence thing? is it guilt? is it stupidity? is it the fact Thatcher is a woman? Is it that Thatcher exposed the state for what it really is-certainly NOT an institution that improves the lives of the less fortunate. I dont know the answer. One thing is for sure these people who so hate her are incapable of offering an alternative contemporary vision as to what should have happened in the 80s.

I think I can answer that in a fairly concise way. Thatcher's view of the world seemed to be that there is indeed "no such thing as society" and that personal freedom is all even if it's exercised at the expense of others. Whilst I'm not against freedom and I'm no fan of the control freakery of the current regime, she took it too far.

Perhaps it's a step too far to blame it all on her - after all she may have just been reflecting a particularly nasty and selfish streak in our nation. She was happy to tell lies and mislead people if she thought she could get away with it - again not unique for a politician, but not a good role model either - unless you are/were a fan of the "it's only wrong if you get caught" mentality she has.

As for "offering an alternative contemporary vision as to what should have happened in the 80s" - a stable economy not prone to booms and recessions and some recognition that in a market based economy, unemployment is the biggest way of excluding people from society (which you don't care about if you don't think there is any such thing).

As for the charge of misogyny - Thatcher was really only a nominal woman - she never made any reference to it and certainly did nothing much to advance the cause of women in general, so hating her for her version of womanhood could hardly be described as misogyny.

I can't forgive her Philistine approach to the Arts and Education, or her introduction of ridiculous sound-bites (like her misquoting of St Francis) that are trotted out to this day.

As for the Falklands, I agree the government had to act, but it's a shame they used our forces (and money) to sort out a mess that they created and were warned about at the time. All the gung ho triumphalists seem to forget this.