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She said more even than that. Week after week, year after year, during questions to the prime minister Foot and then Kinnock attacked her again and again on the issue of Tory support for the NHS. They did so for excellent political reasons: her program of privatization was so thorough-going that Labour knew the British electorate suspected Thatcher of harbouring designs against the NHS. She of course knew it was a bridge too far: the Guardian link in my post above is just one source for the early discussions around the issue among the Downing St inner circle, which resulted in her deciding not to attempt it. So, she defended herself stoutly: insisting with her usual force that her government supported NHS, and as that clip shows, even producing figures (somewhat deceptively) to prove they had spent more on it than the preceding Labour government of Lord Callaghan.
Well, it's very hypothetical, but fine: if we imagine that Margaret Thatcher is a rising American politician today, which party would she belong to? She certainly would have found the God-bothering evangelical religiosity of the contemporary GOP off-putting: like most Britons then and now, she kept her faith to herself and never made a public issue of it. She supported access to abortion because in Britain and northern Europe in the 1970s almost everyone did - outside of Catholic Europe, it wasn't a contested issue at that time. Neither of these topics was remotely central or important to her politics: hate her or love her, she was a serious political figure who dealt in real questions, questions on which the history of the West turned, not emotive fluff.
But is it really germane to tear an historical figure from their context this way? Would Napoleon Bonaparte be a Democrat or a Republican? How about Oliver Cromwell?
An additional thought (sorry to beat the dead horse): if Thatcher's place in the contemporary American political spectrum is at least debatable, I think there's a very good case that her original political enemies, the Tory "wets" such as Sir Edward Heath or Lord Heseltine, would be much more comfortable in the Democratic Party today than the Republican.
And I can make this point without doing violence to historical context, because the present Conservative administration of David Cameron traces its ideological origins at least as much to the old-Tory "wet" tradition as to Thatcherism. Cameron himself, George Osborne, Iain Duncan Smith, William Hague and Theresa May would all be a poor fit for the contemporary GOP - and probably unelectable.
IDS and William Hague were unelectable in the UK as well, as far as leading their party to a general election victory is concerned.
Not that I was all that pleased to see New Labour take 2001 and 2005, but there it is. Wasn't impressed with Gordon Brown's "it's my turn" whinefest either.
IDS and William Hague were unelectable in the UK as well, as far as leading their party to a general election victory is concerned.
True, true! Both lost their shot at Number 10 to the lingering bad taste of Thatcherism. Reminds me a bit of a couple of guys called McCain and Romney? But in their current roles, they're both doing pretty well: capable front-bench ministers, who in due course will be "sent upstairs", where the Noble Lords Smith and Hague will give cogent speeches on important aspects of policy rarely covered in the press, while being frequently asked to comment on news and current-events programs.
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Not that I was all that pleased to see New Labour take 2001 and 2005, but there it is. Wasn't impressed with Gordon Brown's "it's my turn" whinefest either.
Don't count Brown out yet! He may be President of Scotland some day!
True, true! Both lost their shot at Number 10 to the lingering bad taste of Thatcherism. Reminds me a bit of a couple of guys called McCain and Romney? But in their current roles, they're both doing pretty well: capable front-bench ministers, who in due course will be "sent upstairs", where the Noble Lords Smith and Hague will give cogent speeches on important aspects of policy rarely covered in the press, while being frequently asked to comment on news and current-events programs.
Don't count Brown out yet! He may be President of Scotland some day!
LOL...that all sounds about right, except for Gordon Brown being president of Scotland. Would the Scottish really vote for him? I didn't think they cared much for him. If Charles Kennedy wasn't pro-union I'd say he had a better shot at it.
LOL...that all sounds about right, except for Gordon Brown being president of Scotland. Would the Scottish really vote for him? I didn't think they cared much for him. If Charles Kennedy wasn't pro-union I'd say he had a better shot at it.
Yes, I'm just kidding about Brown. I think his political career is toast, and he can look forward to a long and successful future in academe, lobbying or think-tankery. And besides, so far at least, Salmond seems to be saying that even if Scotland goes, it will retain the Queen as head of state. Poor Broun - he'll never be queen.
I have to say she certainly put UK back n the international map. Of course lie everythign shutting down non-profitable governamnt businesses and seling other is never popular with those effected.
Yes, I'm just kidding about Brown. I think his political career is toast, and he can look forward to a long and successful future in academe, lobbying or think-tankery. And besides, so far at least, Salmond seems to be saying that even if Scotland goes, it will retain the Queen as head of state. Poor Broun - he'll never be queen.
Hmm....I guess Scotland would devolve to an 'independent' member of the Commonwealth?
If Thacher would was a moderate Dem, then the "wets" would have been the left wing liberal Dems.
More or less. The correspondences between the British and U.S. political spectrum could be debated endlessly, but in terms of era and policy-outlook, the Wets corresponded more or less to Rockefeller Republicans, so in modern terms, RINOs or somewhere to the left of the GOP, meaning somewhere under the Dem umbrella.
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Originally Posted by Natsku
Not entirely. What about the sermon on the mound?
Yes, good point. And that was not the only public statement you could find where she openly referred to Christianity. But the context says much: she was addressing the Kirk of Scotland General Assembly.
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Originally Posted by Finn_Jarber
What happened to Tonyt Blair becoming the president of EU?
He wasn't offered it - it went to a former Belgian PM instead, Herman Van Rompuy. Given Britain's ambiguous relationship with the E.U., a British candidate for a high E.U. post is always a bit of a dark horse. (Apart from at least one seat in the European Commission, which is more or less guaranteed.)
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Originally Posted by BigDGeek
Hmm....I guess Scotland would devolve to an 'independent' member of the Commonwealth?
Yeah, looks like that would be the model. Scotland would probably end up in the same relationship as, say, Canada or Trinidad and Tobago: constitutionally independent countries which just happen to share the same Head of State and voluntarily belong to the Commonwealth.
'Course, it's not a done deal yet - the SNP could easily lose the referendum. It looks like the constitutional relationship with the E.U. may prove more tricky than with the (dis-)United Kingdom or Commonwealth. Salmond's assumption that Scotland would automatically gain entry has gotten a cold shower lately from Brussels.
She called the ANC and Nelson Mandela 'terrorists".
They are.
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