# How Will History Remember Margaret Thatcher ?



## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Tory  Prime Minster from 1979 to 1990 , called the Iron lady because she was tough and uncompromising . Broke the power of the Unions in the Uk most notably the Coal Union lead by Arthur Scargill. Her Pro business economic polices revived the Uk economy from years  of stagnation, nationalization and strikes. Unfortunately, they benefited the people with money more then the working class ,lots of whom lost jobs and livelihoods . Won the Falkland Islands War against Argentina.  Opposed further economic and political integration with the EU because to protect British Sovereignty.

How would categorize her tenure  as Prime Minister and Party leader? How do you think history will remember her? Will she go down as one of the greats?


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## Foxbat (Aug 31, 2014)

Her real achievement wasn't breaking the unions, it was getting everybody to buy their own homes. It looked like a liberating move but, in reality, it was a way to put a ball and chain on the masses. People could no longer afford to strike and put their homes at risk.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Foxbat said:


> Her real achievement wasn't breaking the unions, it was getting everybody to buy their own homes. It looked like a liberating move but, in reality, it was a way to put a ball and chain on the masses. People could no longer afford to strike and put their homes at risk.



Union power was part of the problem in the Uk. They'd been allowed free reign to do whatever they wanted to business  They wouldn't allow any changes that would cost jobs and that made UK Business less efficient and less competitive. Not a good thing for alot of reasons.


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## thaddeus6th (Aug 31, 2014)

I think she'll always be a divisive figure (not unlike Caesar or Cao Cao in that regard), with strongly held opinions for and against her. Reminds me of an amusing moment I saw on the Sky paper review a year or two ago.

One idiot called her the 'milk-snatcher' (a reference to a leftish rhyme made when, as Education Secretary [I think] she removed free milk from schools). The two other men (one of whom was the presenter and both of whom were older) replied that neither liked the free milk, as it was horrid and warm in summer, or frozen and awful in winter. Whereupon the idiot said he it was before his time.

A leftwing but fairly objective friend of my mother's reckoned Thatcher was right to smash the likes of Scargill but then went too far shutting down mines. It is worth mentioning more mines got closed under Wilson than Thatcher (in the same way manufacturing fell under every PM except Major, it's counter-intuitive and contrary to the general belief).

Blair will have a far worse reputation. Neither right nor left will defend him.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

thaddeus6th said:


> I think she'll always be a divisive figure (not unlike Caesar or Cao Cao in that regard), with strongly held opinions for and against her. Reminds me of an amusing moment I saw on the Sky paper review a year or two ago.
> 
> One idiot called her the 'milk-snatcher' (a reference to a leftish rhyme made when, as Education Secretary [I think] she removed free milk from schools). The two other men (one of whom was the presenter and both of whom were older) replied that neither liked the free milk, as it was horrid and warm in summer, or frozen and awful in winter. Whereupon the idiot said he it was before his time.
> 
> ...



Blair and  New Labour  pretty much adopted many of the economic and foreign policies of the Tories. I suspect that Blair would have come out of it better had he not sent any troops into Iraq and the banking crisis.


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## Foxbat (Aug 31, 2014)

I remember when I visited in Moscow back in the late nineties. I was surprised at how unpopular Gorbachev was when he was seen as something of a hero by the West. I think Thatcher will be the same and be remembered more fondly outside the UK. Blair may be remembered by Bush and that's about it I think.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Foxbat said:


> I remember when I visited in Moscow back in the late nineties. I was surprised at how unpopular Gorbachev was when he was seen as something of a hero by the West. I think Thatcher will be the same and be remembered more fondly outside the UK. Blair may be remembered by Bush and that's about it I think.



Thatcher and Blair would have both done very well in US Politics.


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## The Ace (Aug 31, 2014)

In Scotland, probably unprintably.

Remembered ?  Yes, we also remember Edward I, 'The Hammer of the Scots.'  Revered ? Not in this universe.


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## Foxbat (Aug 31, 2014)

I think The Ace and I can probably agree on this one point: that she's the best weapon the independence campaign has ever had.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Very divisive figure indeed.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Foxbat said:


> I think The Ace and I can probably agree on this one point: that she's the best weapon the independence campaign has ever had.



Before Thatcher didn't the Tory party enjoy greater popularity in Scotland? ?


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## Foxbat (Aug 31, 2014)

BAYLOR said:


> Before Thatcher didn't the Tory party enjoy greater popularity in Scotland? ?


 They did to a certain extent. They were never as strong as Labour but they had a few MPs. During the Thatcher years and since then, they have been -more or less- wiped out and never really recovered. They currently have one Scottish MP (and that's an improvement on 1997)


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## The Ace (Aug 31, 2014)

BAYLOR said:


> Before Thatcher didn't the Tory party enjoy greater popularity?



Not really.  The Conservatives had a slim majority in Scotland in 1955, they lost it in '59 and were subsequently in steady decline.  While they entered the '79 election with 16 seats out of 72, and gained 5 (largely due to the collapse of the SNP vote - the SNP subsequently was taken apart and virtually rebuilt), this disguised a 6% swing to Labour.

Once Thatcher left office, the conservative party in Scotland went into meltdown, culminating in their being wiped out in '97 (they've since regained a single seat).


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

The Ace said:


> In Scotland, probably unprintably.
> 
> Remembered ?  Yes, we also remember Edward I, 'The Hammer of the Scots.'  Revered ? Not in this universe.



Edward Longshanks killed thousand of people in Scotland and ransacked the place . Despicable man.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Foxbat said:


> They did to a certain extent. They were never as strong as Labour but they had a few MPs. During the Thatcher years and since then, they have been -more or less- wiped out and never really recovered. They currently have one Scottish MP (and that's an improvement on 1997)



Only One seat? Wow .


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

I do remeber the song Ghost Town and the riots. It was on the news back in the Early 1980's


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## The Ace (Aug 31, 2014)

BAYLOR said:


> Edward Longshanks killed thousand of people in Scotland and ransacked the place . Despicable man.



Yes, and we see Thatcher much the same way.


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## Jo Zebedee (Aug 31, 2014)

The Norn Irish would be with the Scots on this one. Not a popular lady. And Mr Springs is a dyed-in-the-wool-Northerner from a colliery town. Nuff said.

He has asked you reference Brassed Off, Boys from the Black Stuff and The Full Monty. Enjoy.


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## Brian G Turner (Aug 31, 2014)

Thatcher's worst mistake was the Poll Tax. Trialled it in Scotland first. The Tories haven't had an MP here since.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

Brian Turner said:


> Thatcher's worst mistake was the Poll Tax. Trialled it in Scotland first. The Tories haven't had an MP here since.



Other then alienating the voters , what was the logic behind that policy ?


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## nixie (Aug 31, 2014)

History has away of romanticising , hate to say it but she will likely go down as the second greatest PM in the 20th century. Not because of anything good she done but because she was the first ( and so far  only) female PM in British history. The history books will portray a woman in a man's world, they will glamorise her strengths and gloss over the evil.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 31, 2014)

nixie said:


> History has away of romanticising , hate to say it but she will likely go down as the seconded greatest PM in the 20th century. Not because of anything good she done but because she was the first ( and so far  only) female PM in British history. The history books will portray a woman in a man's world, they will glamorise her strengths and gloss over the evil.



She barely got into office in 1979. First Woman Prime Minster of The UK, yep .  It does make sense that longterm history will blur some of her rough edges.


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## Parson (Sep 1, 2014)

Margret Thatcher's place in history will depend on who's writing the history. If it's written in the States by the conservatives she will go down as the 2nd greatest PM after Churchill in the twentieth century.


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## Michael Colton (Sep 1, 2014)

Like Reagan in the US, it is too divisive of a figure for this sort of judgment to be made yet. There will have to be quite a distance of time for the emotions to settle down - probably to the point where nearly nobody involved in politics at the time is involved in the discussion. Reagan in the US is absolutely adored by some and viciously hated by others - I hear the same sort of comments about Thatcher. Politicians are generally idolized for two to three decades after their deaths. It is only after that point that the ideological loyalty can start to fade and more neutral representations begin.


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## thaddeus6th (Sep 1, 2014)

On the Poll Tax and its really stupid implementation - my understanding from listening to chaps more politically aware than me was this:
the Treasury civil servants hated the idea and deliberately devised a way of introducing it which would piss people off
Oliver Letwin was involved [for those unaware, Oliver Letwin is a very nice Conservative who couldn't run a piss-up in a brewery. Seems like a splendid chap but I wouldn't leave him in charge of a rocking horse]

Also worth mentioning by that stage I think (too young to remember, again using second hand info) Thatcher had passed the point of confidence into slightly bonkers arrogance.


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## thaddeus6th (Sep 1, 2014)

Edited: deleted due to double-posting.


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## The Ace (Sep 1, 2014)

BAYLOR said:


> Other then alienating the voters , what was the logic behind that policy ?



Officially she, 'Couldn't get her message across,' in Scotland.  In reality, she knew we could see right through her and would never support her - so she set out to punish us.


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## thaddeus6th (Sep 1, 2014)

Really? Wasn't the plan to roll out the Poll Tax across the whole country?


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## The Ace (Sep 1, 2014)

Yes, but by introducing it in Scotland first, she actually violated the Treaty of Union.

Remember, most such projects are trialled in London, or at least in an area with strong government support.  The Poll Tax was seen from the outset as unpopular (just necessary in a twisted way) so Scotland got it a year early.


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## BAYLOR (Sep 1, 2014)

thaddeus6th said:


> On the Poll Tax and its really stupid implementation - my understanding from listening to chaps more politically aware than me was this:
> the Treasury civil servants hated the idea and deliberately devised a way of introducing it which would piss people off
> Oliver Letwin was involved [for those unaware, Oliver Letwin is a very nice Conservative who couldn't run a piss-up in a brewery. Seems like a splendid chap but I wouldn't leave him in charge of a rocking horse]
> 
> Also worth mentioning by that stage I think (too young to remember, again using second hand info) Thatcher had passed the point of confidence into slightly bonkers arrogance.



Autocratic rule by any other name. 

 The book SpyCatcher. She couldn't stop it's publication but she keep it out of the Uk for years.


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## Gramm838 (Sep 1, 2014)

Bearing in mind that she came into office in 1979, her first real achievement was dragging us out of the 1950's - and then when Scargill tried to usurp power through the unions, she showed real balls by taking him on head to head and demonstrating that she was the elected power, not him.

As for the poll tax, it's still the fairest way to levy tax (i.e. pay your own way), and the fact that Scotland got it first is incidental - if it had been levied in Liverpool (another socialist enclave) the reaction would have been the same. You could say it was the first round of the battle against the benefits culture in the UK.

Let's not forget she also refused to give the Falklands up, and stood up to most of the European silliness, and as someone has already said, maybe her biggest achievement was allowing people to buy their own homes, but that has now come back to bite us, and until profits on house sales are taxed heavily and the housing market is killed stone dead, my 25-year old boy will never be in a position to buy a house.

Over to you, Ace...


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## BAYLOR (Sep 1, 2014)

Britain's economy was in rough shape at that time . If Labour had somehow managed to hold on in the 79 election ,  wouldn't they have been forced into making entitlement cutbacks and economic reforms?


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## Null_Zone (Sep 1, 2014)

A woman that inherited a truly terrible position and left the country in a much stronger state.

Her ways of achieving this, both the good and bad, will be marginalized to academic bickering in favour of the my dad says she's was evil/wonderful of internet debates on politicians and the tyrants she courted will be forgotten.


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## The Ace (Sep 1, 2014)

I remember her, evil incarnate sounds about right.

I didn't attend a Thatcher death party, or download, 'Ding Dong ! The Witch is Dead,' but I can understand the people who did.

IMO they could've settled the whole Falklands thing by sticking Thatcher and Galtieri on a rock somewhere in mid-Atlantic, and then coming back later for the survivor - or not.


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## Foxbat (Sep 2, 2014)

Some things to remember about Thatcher. She encouraged MPs to use the expenses system to supplement their wages (to keep the wage bill down and therefore avoid the ire of the public). We all know the results of that.

She moved huge numbers of people off the dole and on to incapacity benefit just to massage the numbers so she actually made the benefits system worse and almost single-handedly created the 'entitlement society' we see today.

She was happy to stand side by side with Pinochet - one of the worst South American tyrants.

Thatcher failed on The Falklands by withdrawing full British citizenship from the islanders in 1981. It was plain for Argentina to see that the time was ripe for a move as UK commitment was on the wane. She could probably have avoided the whole war and loss of life on both sides by showing greater commitment but chose to make savage economic cuts instead (which is partly why citizenship was withdrawn). The actual withdrawal of citizenship was because of fears of an influx of Hong Kong residents when China took over the city and was applied to all dependencies.


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## paranoid marvin (Sep 2, 2014)

She will be remembered; which is more than can be said for most other PMs. She didn't pull any punches and did things her own way regardless of the consequences. She broke the back of the unions; remember up til the 80s strikes/3 day weeks/power outages etc were all common practice.

She also brought about the 'whats in it for me' society rather than people working as a community. Her policies put many out of jobs and almost destroyed parts of the country; her government's solution being to 'get on your bike' and work elsewhere. She courted foreign dictators. She shackled us to the US with our 'special relationship; the one were we became a nuclear missile silo and in return the PM got to go to Washington.

Pretty much came down to this; if you were rich you became richer, if you were poor you were ground into the earth, which is pretty much why those well off supported her and those not so fortunate hated her.

Personally I think the country would have been much better off without her. But it did make for some cracking episodes of Spitting Image with Maggie and her vegetables.


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## Foxbat (Sep 3, 2014)

> Personally I think the country would have been much better off without her. But it did make for some cracking episodes of Spitting Image with Maggie and her vegetables.


 
How very true. I'd forgotten all about Spitting Image


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## thaddeus6th (Sep 3, 2014)

Marvin, worth recalling she won three elections. I don't buy that everyone who wasn't rich loathed her.

Reminds me of Blair, who is now widely reviled. At the time, he won two landslides and a third very solid victory. [Difference being Thatcher also has supporters now, whereas I'm not sure Blair does].


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## The Ace (Sep 3, 2014)

thaddeus6th said:


> Marvin, worth recalling she won three elections. I don't buy that everyone who wasn't rich loathed her.
> 
> Reminds me of Blair, who is now widely reviled. At the time, he won two landslides and a third very solid victory. [Difference being Thatcher also has supporters now, whereas I'm not sure Blair does].



Not in Scotland, she didn't.


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## thaddeus6th (Sep 3, 2014)

Tried finding figures on seats for Scotland in those elections, but couldn't (well, not fairly quickly). Anyway, she won a clear majority in the UK and I believe she always had double figures of Scottish MPs. 

In 2005 Michael Howard won more English votes than Labour, but we still had a majority for the latter of about 60, with a Scottish PM and Scottish Chancellor. That's how democracy works. Your side doesn't always get to win, and if it doesn't that does not make the result illegitimate. In the same way, the referendum result [assuming no foul play] will be valid and should be respected by all sides.


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## Null_Zone (Sep 3, 2014)

The Ace said:


> Not in Scotland, she didn't.


 Because of course local opinion is all that matters in UK elections and global reputation...


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## The Ace (Sep 3, 2014)

Null_Zone said:


> Because of course local opinion is all that matters in UK elections and global reputation...



That all depends on how you see Scotland.  Of course, her contribution to the cause of Scottish independence is unquestioned.


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## paranoid marvin (Sep 3, 2014)

Don't get the hate for Blair. Yes there were definately question marks over the Iraq wars, but by and large he didn't do too badly; possibly the first PM to blur lines between Labour and Conservative.

Of course by the end Thatcher united both the Conservatives and the Labour supporters - they pretty much all hated her.


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## The Ace (Sep 3, 2014)

paranoid marvin said:


> Don't get the hate for Blair. Yes there were definately question marks over the Iraq wars, but by and large he didn't do too badly; *possibly the first PM to blur lines between Labour and Conservative.*
> 
> Of course by the end Thatcher united both the Conservatives and the Labour supporters - they pretty much all hated her.



My bold - And there you have it.  We waited 18 years for the Labour government we voted for, and that's what we got.

The only good thing Blair did was the referendum which led to the Scottish Parliament being reconvened.  The people delivered it, he just gave permission.


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## BAYLOR (Sep 3, 2014)

What would Britain be like today , if she never became Prime Minister? Better or worse of?


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## Foxbat (Sep 4, 2014)

BAYLOR said:


> What would Britain be like today , if she never became Prime Minister? Better or worse of?


 
I think our navy would be in a worse state than it is now if she hadn't come to power. The blundering into war over the Falkands opened our eyes when it was all about cutting costs. If I remember correctly, sale of The Hermes had already been agreed and if that had gone through, we might never have won in the end. It put the brakes on defence cuts to a certain extent.

I don't think we would be having this independence referendum if she hadn't come to power. In many ways, she was the last straw for a lot of people in Scotland.

Ironically, her decimation of Scottish heavy industry probably allowed Scotland time to recover and realign itself economically before actually reaching the point of deciding whether to stay or leave the UK. She may, in truth, be the prime architect of a new United Kingdom without Scotland.


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## Gramm838 (Sep 6, 2014)

That the problem Ace - the great majority of people in the UK are not massively interested in which political entity is ruining their lives - we just want continuity and consistency. If that means blurring the lines between parties then that's a good thing.

No political party can satisfy even the majority of their own voters - while in Labour there is the loony left that wants to take my earnings off me and give to some workshy scrounger, there are also others in Labour who are willing to let the market do most of the work.


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## Gramm838 (Sep 6, 2014)

BAYLOR said:


> What would Britain be like today , if she never became Prime Minister? Better or worse of?


That would have to depend on would have come to power if she hadn't. if it continued to be Jim Callaghan we'd all be living in almost continual darkness as the energy industry would be controlled by the mining unions; and if someone other than her from the Tories had got into power, we'd have been subject to regular elections as no Tory would have been the man she was, and their government would not have had a really workable majority (even if it was a majority in numbers, the union power base would be on the streets all the time).

We'd still be stuck, even now, in a 1970's timewarp. It was her breaking of union power that severed the umbilical cord between labour and the unions, and if that had not have happened, we wouldn't be where we are now so we would be massively worse off without any doubt.


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## AnyaKimlin (Sep 6, 2014)

In the safe SNP seats of the era - Conservatives are often the second party. Where I live you wouldn't think Labour or Lib-Dems actually existed.

Personally, I don't think you had to like her or her policies to have an admiration for the way she operated.  No politician who makes it to PM is going to be entirely free of corruption. An awful lot of people were far better off under Thatcher than we are now.  Some people that is reversed.


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## paranoid marvin (Sep 6, 2014)

If Labour had got elected, then it's quite possible that we would have seen nuclear disarmament; could have changed quite a lot of things that. At a time of what seemed like imminent nuclear attack from the USSR, with the only thing (apparently) stopping the, being American missiles on UK bases, it could have been a real game changer on the political scene. It's also possibly why people voted for the Tories.


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## Aquilonian (Oct 5, 2014)

The question presupposed that there is such a thing as "History," presumably meaning a consensus of opinion among historians, ie academics leading very comfortable lives compared to most people. Somebody once said "A professor is a policeman of the intellect."

In fact there are as many versions of history as there are factions/special interest groups in a society. Ruling elites attempt to control history, often by the use of ritual and symbolism (acts of real magick) of which Thatcher's state funeral was a good example. Sometimes these rituals are derailed as in Diana's funeral- but the Establishement moves swiftly to repair any damage done. By controlling the past they control the present and the future.

But meanwhile the downtrodden and the dispossesed pass on their own histories, in whispers maybe, or in disguised forms. The internet has made a huge difference, but not as much as could have been- Wikipedia is a powerful tool for the elites to regain control of history, because most people are so lazy they'll go direct to wikipedia rather than trawling through dozens of different sites. Still, much of the truth is out there for those who can be bothered looking. I say "much of" because there are still rumours about recent history that don't seem to appear online.

Anyway, insofar as a consensus is achievable, I think that even her fans would surely agree that she was the most divisive figure in 20th century UK politics. Until Tony Blair she was also the most hated. I don't mean by everyone, of course. But Thatcher's opponents hated her with a real, gut-level hatred and rage that no other previous politician had evoked. And we still do.


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## BAYLOR (Oct 5, 2014)

Interesting stuff so far.


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## BAYLOR (Jan 1, 2015)

Parson said:


> Margret Thatcher's place in history will depend on who's writing the history. If it's written in the States by the conservatives she will go down as the 2nd greatest PM after Churchill in the twentieth century.



That is a possibility.


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## Gramm838 (Jan 2, 2015)

BAYLOR said:


> That is a possibility.



I wonder if actually Blair would get the vote before Thatcher, if its being written by Americans?


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## BAYLOR (Jan 2, 2015)

Gramm838 said:


> I wonder if actually Blair would get the vote before Thatcher, if its being written by Americans?



They would have both been very successful in US politics.


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## AnyaKimlin (Jan 2, 2015)

Americans really do have strange taste in politicians.


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## Ray McCarthy (Jan 2, 2015)

BAYLOR said:


> They would have both been very successful in US politics.


They both were very successful in US politics and implementing US policies.


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## BAYLOR (Jan 3, 2015)

Ray McCarthy said:


> They both were very successful in US politics and implementing US policies.




Interesting point and accurate .


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## BAYLOR (Jan 3, 2015)

AnyaKimlin said:


> Americans really do have strange taste in politicians.



We tend to vote for people who are charismatic and  photogenic and can talk a good line.


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## AnyaKimlin (Jan 3, 2015)

BAYLOR said:


> We tend to vote for people who are charismatic and  photogenic and can talk a good line.



And that's Tony Blair and George W Bush?  Guess I just don't see it.


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## BAYLOR (Jan 3, 2015)

AnyaKimlin said:


> And that's Tony Blair and George W Bush?  Guess I just don't see it.



The camera definitely agreed with Blair . And Bush could be a very persuasive on camera. He convinced us to go to war in Iraq

Reagan's training as an actor aided him in his quest to becoming President. He knew how to talk to the public , Knew what the voters wanted to hear .


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## thaddeus6th (Jan 3, 2015)

To be fair, Baylor, Blair had an interesting interpretation of the facts (WMD turned out to mean battlefield munitions, for example). 

Thatcher will be treated far better by history than Blair. Leaving aside greater competence, she'll always have many rightwingers on-side. Brown will always have at least some leftwingers on-side. Who will Blair have? It's hard to see many, right or left, backing him. Those disinterested in politics generally will remember only Iraq (and that's fair enough, it's the defining feature of his decade long premiership).

As an aside, it's curious that of recent PMs John Major appears to be remembered surprisingly fondly. Perhaps it's because he was a fundamentally decent bloke, whereas those before and after him appear either too harsh, or smarmy chancers.


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## Gramm838 (Jan 4, 2015)

thaddeus6th said:


> To be fair, Baylor, Blair had an interesting interpretation of the facts (WMD turned out to mean battlefield munitions, for example).



It seems incredible to me that people seem to gloss over the fact that the UN WMD inspectors gave Saddam so much time to get his chemical weapons hidden away in Syria. It's a good job they won't ever get used. Oh, wait....


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## AnyaKimlin (Jan 4, 2015)

Gramm838 said:


> It seems incredible to me that people seem to gloss over the fact that the UN WMD inspectors gave Saddam so much time to get his chemical weapons hidden away in Syria. It's a good job they won't ever get used. Oh, wait....



Not in the UK we didn't.  Most people I knew were asking what had happened to them and who was pointing them at us.


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## Foxbat (Jan 5, 2015)

What's most astonishing is not that WMD were not found but that they were actually used in the 1980s by Saddam against the Kurds and Iranians. Thatcher was in power at the time and - given her staunch defence of Pinochet and his regime later on - is it any surprise that nothing was done then? The Iranians were seen as the greater threat and the old 'enemy of my enemy is my friend' mentality was prevailant at the time.

By the time Blair came along, the WMD situation became more of an excuse to invade rather than a principle to fight for.


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## thaddeus6th (Jan 5, 2015)

Foxbat, it could be argued, given the current situation with ISIS that, using the 10 year plus situation as the sole criterion, Thatcher made the right call and Blair the wrong one. 

Of course, there's more to it than that.


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## AnyaKimlin (Jan 5, 2015)

Mrs Thatcher was many things but on this I see where she was coming from.  Her later support of Pinochet was less understandable but .... when it comes to world affairs she achieved a lot that felt forward thinking whereas Blair had his nose surgically implanted up Bush's rear end.


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## Ray McCarthy (Jan 5, 2015)

Foxbat said:


> WMD were not found but that they were actually used in the 1980s by Saddam against the Kurds and Iranians


More weapons of local & limited destruction. I think mostly against the Marsh Arabs in south. Kurds are North.
Chemical weapons are not actually WMD unless you have huge bomber force / loads of missiles and vast quantity. They are undoubtedly horrible and the Marsh Arabs had small villages and no Anti-aircraft.
The Iraqi-Iranian conflicts largely conventional.


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## Foxbat (Jan 5, 2015)

Ray McCarthy said:


> More weapons of local & limited destruction. I think mostly against the Marsh Arabs in south. Kurds are North.
> Chemical weapons are not actually WMD unless you have huge bomber force / loads of missiles and vast quantity. They are undoubtedly horrible and the Marsh Arabs had small villages and no Anti-aircraft.
> The Iraqi-Iranian conflicts largely conventional.



As you will see here the Kurds did suffer chemical attack (I remember this when it hit the news).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halabja_chemical_attack


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## Gramm838 (Jan 6, 2015)

Ray McCarthy said:


> More weapons of local & limited destruction. I think mostly against the Marsh Arabs in south. Kurds are North.
> Chemical weapons are not actually WMD unless you have huge bomber force / loads of missiles and vast quantity. They are undoubtedly horrible and the Marsh Arabs had small villages and no Anti-aircraft.
> The Iraqi-Iranian conflicts largely conventional.



If a chemical weapon of any kind kills all of your family, to you that's a WMD. To try and classify them in any other way is simply hair-splitting to a pointless degree.


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## Michael Colton (Jan 6, 2015)

Gramm838 said:


> If a chemical weapon of any kind kills all of your family, to you that's a WMD. To try and classify them in any other way is simply hair-splitting to a pointless degree.



This is not quite true. WMD has to have a specific meaning in order for international law, inspectors, and conversations to be coherent. By your definition drowning a whole family in bleach would classify said bleach as a WMD. Terms have meanings and they are important - especially in political and legal situations.

A good example of the importance of terminology was the coining of the term 'enemy combatant.'


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## Foxbat (Jan 7, 2015)

The problem with such definitions is the double standards that follows them around like a bad smell. 

Here is the complaint against the Boston Bomber. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/06/27/us/28tsarvaev-indictment.html

as you can see, charged with the use of a Weapon Of Mass Destruction. 

If a bomb planted at a marathon can be a WMD then why can't a village of Kurds wiped out in a chemical attack?


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## BAYLOR (Mar 16, 2015)

Foxbat said:


> The problem with such definitions is the double standards that follows them around like a bad smell.
> 
> Here is the complaint against the Boston Bomber. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/06/27/us/28tsarvaev-indictment.html
> 
> ...



Interesting point, that last bit.


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## paranoid marvin (Mar 28, 2015)

thaddeus6th said:


> To be fair, Baylor, Blair had an interesting interpretation of the facts (WMD turned out to mean battlefield munitions, for example).
> 
> Thatcher will be treated far better by history than Blair. Leaving aside greater competence, she'll always have many rightwingers on-side. Brown will always have at least some leftwingers on-side. Who will Blair have? It's hard to see many, right or left, backing him. Those disinterested in politics generally will remember only Iraq (and that's fair enough, it's the defining feature of his decade long premiership).
> 
> As an aside, it's curious that of recent PMs John Major appears to be remembered surprisingly fondly. Perhaps it's because he was a fundamentally decent bloke, whereas those before and after him appear either too harsh, or smarmy chancers.




Anyone after Thatcher would have been seen as a 'good thing'! To be honest though, many people's perceptions of political (and other) characters was defined by Spitting Image. They treated JM pretty decently , and I think that the general concensus of him was that he was a nice bloke.


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## BAYLOR (May 24, 2015)

paranoid marvin said:


> Anyone after Thatcher would have been seen as a 'good thing'! To be honest though, many people's perceptions of political (and other) characters was defined by Spitting Image. They treated JM pretty decently , and I think that the general concensus of him was that he was a nice bloke.




He wasn't as polarizing as Thatcher.


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## BAYLOR (Feb 28, 2016)

I don't think we've seen the last of Thatcherism.


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## Gramm838 (Feb 29, 2016)

Michael Colton said:


> This is not quite true. WMD has to have a specific meaning in order for international law, inspectors, and conversations to be coherent. By your definition drowning a whole family in bleach would classify said bleach as a WMD. Terms have meanings and they are important - especially in political and legal situations.
> 
> A good example of the importance of terminology was the coining of the term 'enemy combatant.'



Who died and put lawyers in charge? They are part of the problem, not part of the solution


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## BAYLOR (May 15, 2016)

Gramm838 said:


> Who died and put lawyers in charge? They are part of the problem, not part of the solution



Lawyers tend to put themselves in charge.


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