RIP Margaret Thatcher

awec

This post has been deleted.

GRMA

She was a bull**** artist too, she did negotiate and talk with the IRA.


No tears shed here, I'll be drinking tonight in memory of her victims.

EDIT: Well, if I drank anymore.

GRMA

awec wrote: »

The UK as a whole was better off for Thatcher's policies. That is not to say every single person was better off, but the majority certainly were.

How many working class people were empowered to purchase their homes for example?

Those that suffered most worked in old industrial industries. They wouldn't have lasted, with or without Thatcher.

lol

Get real.

Most working class people couldnt afford to buy their council homes (if they did why would they need social housing?) instead these social houses were bought up by people who didnt need them, many are owned by rich folk today and housing lists are massive. The winners with that policy are the people who are making a mint renting these houses out, not working class people.

Rastadoyle

Rabidlamb wrote: »

Can't see a minutes silence being observed too fondly in this weekends premiership fixtures.

Especially at the Newcastle - Sunderland game!

Galwayguy35

COYW wrote: »

RIP. A truly memorable political figure.

For the British maybe but not us.

She was the thankfully the last British PM who regarded all things Irish as something to be looked down on and at best tolerated.

Maybe she did some good in Britain and that is for them to assess but nothing good could be said about her attitude to Ireland.

southsiderosie

Happyman42 wrote: »

Who just all happen to have the same view and came fom the same communities? You are being ridiculous championing this moden day dictator and woman who would stoop to almost anything to achieve her rotten aims.

I am no fan of Thatcher, but calling her a dictator is ridiculous. She was an elected official, and her dictatorial approach is what got her shoved out of politics - by her own party, no less.

LordSutch

1979 the Winter of discontent, Britain was on its knees > then Mrs Thatch arrives.

Loved and loathed in equal amounts across Ireland and Britain. Arch enemy of the IRA, Colonel Gadaffi, the Argintine Junta, and of course the miners and their unions with Arthur (three shredded wheat) Scargill as their beligerant mouthpiece!

Mrs Thatch palyed hard ball and won every time. At the same time she gave so many people in Britain the chance to buy the council houses, she threw out the old industries and brought in the new, she transformed Britain from the winter if discontent (James Callaghan) to 'Loads a money' and Privitisation whilst also putting many people out of work from the old industries . . . . . .

From one extreme to the other, loved and loathed.

Personally I thought it good that she played hard ball with the Provo's, because that's all they understaood, (they killed her friend Airey Neave, Lord Mountbatten, and they nearly killed her in Brighton), so I can totally understand her hard ball attitude to the IRA, same goes for General Leopoldo Galtieri and the rest of the Argentine Junta, although I still have reservations about the sinking of the Belgrano.

Thought Adams was a bit quick with his comments today, (but then he was her arch enemy), and I guess Scargill will be toasting her departure too with a glass of bubbly (along with many ex miners and their families) in the North of England. Many in the City of London & middle England will of course mourn her passing, but I think everybody who remembers her reign will have an opinion on one of the most powerful & visionary leaders of recent World history.

Iwasfrozen

Happyman42 wrote: »

And you can't see the irony of having that view?
The only people praising this woman are those who benefitted fom her socially disastrous policy.
They are the same people who cannot see that huge swathes of people in decimated communities negatively impact on us all.
We can all take 'negative impact' fom time to time, what Thatcher did profoundly was consign people to being negatively impacted for generations.

The country as a whole benefited. Not everyone sure but only those who were relying on the state or support anyway. Like I said earlier, dead weight.

Iwasfrozen

karma_ wrote: »

The poor woman?

I find it peculiar that in one thread you promote the philosophy that two wrongs don't make a right and almost in the same breath you're in here mourning one of the foulest politicians of the 20th century.

The great equaliser of man just claimed her and I'll be neither shedding tears nor mourning her.

Today I think a lot of Irish people and British people can agree on this, and that is no bad thing.

Please do explain her how she was foul? She saw what needed to be done and had the balls to do it. I just wish we had politicians like her.

karma_

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Please do explain her how she was foul? She saw what needed to be done and had the balls to do it. I just wish we had politicians like her.

Just how many wrongs does it take to make a right then, in your view? Or does your philosophy just change like the wind, from thread to thread?

I just wish we had politicians like her.

Of this, I have absolutely no doubt.

K-9

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Please do explain her how she was foul? She saw what needed to be done and had the balls to do it. I just wish we had politicians like her.

Internal political matters are an question of right or left wing, but things like Pinochet, How Thatcher gave Pol Pot a hand, questionable views on homosexuals and HIV, her black and white view on football hooliganism, Hillsborough, the miners, the police and Mandela and Apartheid.

There's a hell of a lot not to like and morally unjustifiable, but maybe that's just me. The fact that the Tories have never got back to their support levels of 25 years ago probably suggests a lot still associate here with Tory values. They can't get an overall majority while Scotland, Wales and most of Northern England see them as unelectable.

Zyzz

Mod: Video only post, not allowed.

esteve

K-9 wrote: »

Internal political matters are an question of right or left wing, but things like Pinochet, How Thatcher gave Pol Pot a hand, questionable views on homosexuals and HIV, her black and white view on football hooliganism, Hillsborough, the miners, the police and Mandela and Apartheid.

And let us please not forget the poor people of East Timor, whose small nation had its population reduced by a quarter after the invasion and occupation by Indonesia. Thatcher openly and fully supported Suharto, aswell as providing him with the weaponry that allowed him to commit genocide and also control the people of Indonesia.

TOMASJ

Another War criminal gone,
Cant see her being missed by Irish people

LordSutch

Irish Republicans in particular ^

COYW

Galwayguy35 wrote: »

She was the thankfully the last British PM who regarded all things Irish as something to be looked down on and at best tolerated.

Can you give me an example? I don't recall such an attitude. She gave us (the country) a role in N.I. via the Anglo-Irish agreement, with a view to ending the "troubles". Hardly a position you give to someone you look down on. She saw right through CJH, as a person, never gave him the time of day; I think you'll agree she was spot on there. As has been said before on this forum, most Irish people don't like politicians with brains, conviction and drive, three qualities she had in abundance.

Galwayguy35 wrote: »

Maybe she did some good in Britain and that is for them to assess but nothing good could be said about her attitude to Ireland.

Take some time to read her autobiography and also to compare the economic state of the UK, before and after office. You don't have to like her but you have to respect the results she got. Breaking the hold that trade unionism had on GB was a remarkable achievement. It would be akin to breaking the hold that the RCC had here in decades gone by.

K-9

LordSutch wrote: »

Irish Republicans in particular ^

Most Moderate Nationalists don't see too much to crow about either.

TOMASJ

LordSutch wrote: »

Irish Republicans in particular ^

Or Unionist,
Was it not the first minister Peter Robinison who claimed that
"she prostituted herself" regarding the Anglo Irish agreement

COYW

TOMASJ wrote: »

Or Unionist,
Was it not the first minister Peter Robinison who claimed that
"she prostituted herself" regarding the Anglo Irish agreement

I don't recall those words but they disagreed with it. Big Ian had a right go. I recall him standing in front of her once with a big 'Ulster Says No' banner when she was making a speech. She barely flinched.

karma_

COYW wrote: »

I don't recall it being that strong verbally but they disagreed with it. Big Ian had a right go. I recall him standing in front of her once with a big 'Ulster Says No' banner when she was making a speech. She barely flinched.

To say they disagreed is to put it mildly. I remember that time, like Sunningdale, they tried to bring it down. If you think the flag protest was bad, the protest at the AIA was HUGE and dwarfed the Fleg protest by a massive margin.

Fits Morris

Thatcher was a great supporter of strikes. Strikes such as the ones by the murderous Indonesian regime of the dictator Suharto with their British-made Hawk aircraft against the innocent civilians of East Timor.

She was a great supporter of decriminalisation of Pot - that's Pol Pot, the man responsible for a genocide that killed one and a quarter million people in Cambodia, and whose Khmer Rouge terrorists Britain armed and trained throughout the 1980s after they'd been driven into exile in Thailand.

Her government smuggled arms from apartheid South Africa to Loyalist death squads to kill innocent Catholics.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/oct/15/uk-arms-northern-ireland-loyalist-massacre

Remember when a group of islands populated by British citizens in the middle of an ocean, many thousands of miles away, were invaded by another country's military?

Remember how Thatcher reacted?

Oh, yeah. Those islands were the Chagos Islands, and she collaborated with the invaders, while denying the islanders (who'd been rounded up and escorted to slums in Mauritius on a boat literally full of horse dung) their human rights. In fact she denied their very existence.

Pol Pot, Pinochet, Suharto, Botha, Reagan.

By your friends shall ye be known.

excollier

awec wrote: »

For closing the mines?

They were working at a loss. They were being held back by union demands. They had to be closed.

There is a reason that no subsequent government has tried to breath life back into the mining industry. It was dead long before Thatcher turned off it's life support machine.

The vast majority of people benefitted from Thatcherism in the UK, looking back it can be seen as a necessary evil. Plenty of people don't like the woman, even more people don't like the fact that that woman's policies benefited them.

The fact remains that the UK as a whole was much better off for her policies.

The coal mine where I worked was actually turning a profit, it still closed.......

CelticDragon7

History will remember that she ruled with a lack of compassion and an unwillingness to compromise. But a 'true' opponent would show her that compassion. RIP Iron Lady.

wordsmithi

I didn't like her at all but may she rest in peace.

Happyman42

It really is funny to see Unionists reacting to her death. Peter Robinson trying to make the right noises while knowing full well that it was her that sold them out. She didn't even realise what she had done herself until later.

snaps

Are the flags flying half mast at city hall in Belfast...............????

Happyman42

snaps wrote: »

Are the flags flying half mast at city hall in Belfast...............????

Don't think so, they are at Hillsborough.

theoneeyedman

A lot of the eulogies are saying how her economic policies turned around the British economy. Most are convieniently forgetting that huge revenues were coming on stream from North Sea oil from tge early eighties in particular. This money boosted the uk coffers greatly, ratger than her policies..
Indeed, her policies and the ideology behind it(free marketeers, light touch regulation, housing boom, death of manufacturing) played a big part in the greatest economic crash in almost 100 years....

Happyman42

Not much love in Brixton for her tonight. You cannot polarise a society so badly and for so long and deserve the epithat of a 'good leader'.
http://metro.co.uk/2013/04/08/hundreds-attend-parties-to-celebrate-death-of-margaret-thatcher-3588431/

Eggy Baby!

Thatcher was hated by the Irish and loved/hated by the British. Apparently there are going to be parties throughout the week in NUIM (my college) in celebration at her passing...

Iwasfrozen

Happyman42 wrote: »

Not much love in Brixton for her tonight. You cannot polarise a society so badly and for so long and deserve the epithat of a 'good leader'.
http://metro.co.uk/2013/04/08/hundreds-attend-parties-to-celebrate-death-of-margaret-thatcher-3588431/

Disgusting. Makes me ashamed to be human.

Colonialboy

awec wrote: »

For closing the mines?

They were working at a loss. They were being held back by union demands. They had to be closed.
...
The fact remains that the UK as a whole was much better off for her policies.

great logic, lets apply that to the Banks and The City ... close the loss making white collar institutions

oh hang on her policies laid the foundation for socialise debt and privatise gain ..

The only good thing she left is a bit of Ska ..

periodictable

southsiderosie wrote: »

I'm always puzzled by these kinds of comments - just because someone has a vision and conviction, doesn't mean that their vision is something that you would ever want to see implemented. History is riddled with leaders that had vision and conviction, but at the expense of terrible human suffering.

I wonder if you actually remember the state of the UK just before she was elected? I certainly do, and it was militant unelected trades unionists that were attempting to take power. I also remember the Warsaw Pact buildups and the Soviet aggression from Afghanistan to Poland, with Soviets killing or imprisoning people when not shooting down civilian aircraft.
Her vision was to defend the freedoms we have, and to remove as much as possible the role of government from the private sphere. My regret is that she didn't get another 10 years.

Madam

She most certainly did not live up to her inauguration speech:rolleyes:

"Where there is discord, may we bring harmony. Where there is error, may we bring truth. Where there is doubt, may we bring faith. And where there is despair, may we bring hope."

Happyman42

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Disgusting. Makes me ashamed to be human.

I'm sure the pomp and ceremony of her funeral will disgust those consigned to generation after generation of no hope and degadation by the short tem success of her policies in equal measure.
When you see demonstrations like this, so many years after her term you have got to ask yourself, 'what has she done?'

GRMA

Wish I was in Belfast tonight... big session on the falls

Busted Flat.

She will have no problem meeting friends to where she is heading, Pol Pot, Botha, Pino$hit, Regan, over the Iran Contr, stretch it a bit more Hitler, Stalin. I am sure there a few more that will be sitting around the big fire. A sad and sick dictator that had no regard even for her own people.

Madam

A well - hell is full then?

Busted Flat.

Madam wrote: »

A well - hell is full then?

No they had a reserved space for her and Hitler.

Vivienne23

Been reading this thread with great interest , also doing a bit of googling on why the Irish hate Mrs. Thatcher , ( wouldn't be the best with history) the main thing I can see is the hunger strikes and that she wouldn't give concessions to criminals ??? The concessions things like not having to work in prison , to wear your normal clothes , recreation activities ! Was it a holiday camp or a prison they thought they were in ? Unfortunately people died and this is tragic , but was she holding food from them ? Or was it personal choice for the strikers !

Also the fact that a year after she was nearly bombed out of it she signs an Anglo -Irish agreement , doesn't sound like an unreasonable lady ,

After seeing some of the posts on Facebook today I'm sickened as in the end she didn't die a leader , she died a mother, a widow , a grandmother , a frail woman suffering with a terrible disease ,

RIP Margaret

karma_

Vivienne23 wrote: »

Been reading this thread with great interest , also doing a bit of googling on why the Irish hate Mrs. Thatcher , ( wouldn't be the best with history) the main thing I can see is the hunger strikes and that she wouldn't give concessions to criminals ??? The concessions things like not having to work in prison , to wear your normal clothes , recreation activities ! Was it a holiday camp or a prison they thought they were in ? Unfortunately people died and this is tragic , but was she holding food from them ? Or was it personal choice for the strikers !

Also the fact that a year after she was nearly bombed out of it she signs an Anglo -Irish agreement , doesn't sound like an unreasonable lady ,

After seeing some of the posts on Facebook today I'm sickened as in the end she didn't die a leader , she died a mother, a widow , a grandmother , a frail woman suffering with a terrible disease ,

RIP Margaret

Not to mention she helped prolong the Troubles for years.

LordSutch

Vivienne23 wrote: »

Been reading this thread with great interest , also doing a bit of googling on why some the Irish hate Mrs. Thatcher , ( wouldn't be the best with history) the main thing I can see is the hunger strikes and that she wouldn't give concessions to criminals ??? The concessions things like not having to work in prison , to wear your normal clothes , recreation activities ! Was it a holiday camp or a prison they thought they were in ? Unfortunately people died and this is tragic , but was she holding food from them ? Or was it personal choice for the strikers !

Also the fact that a year after she was nearly bombed out of it she signs an Anglo -Irish agreement , doesn't sound like an unreasonable lady ,

After seeing some of the posts on Facebook today I'm sickened as in the end she didn't die a leader , she died a mother, a widow , a grandmother , a frail woman suffering with a terrible disease ,

RIP Margaret

Good post Vivienne, and I just made one adjustment for you in your 1st sentence.

I was actually working in Dublin at the time of the hunger strikes in 1981 (1st job) and I can assure you that Ireland and the Irish were split down the middle as to their opinions on Mrs Thatcher. In my Dublin office & my surroundings everybody would have been very pro Thatcher re her stance against the IRA and the hunger strikers, but I was also totally aware of the black flags in some South Dublin estates where the hunger strikers & the PIRA were supported and Thatchers name was dirt!

Iwasfrozen

karma_ wrote: »

Not to mention she helped prolong the Troubles for years.

See this is the sort of bull **** opinion that makes me sad for humanity. You'd swear Thatcher was the one planting bombs.

pgmcpq

The lasting legacy of her reign is that she (in common and in combination with Reagan) shifted the entire political discourse to the right. Ironcially (maybe - maybe not!) in doing so she laid the foundations for "New Labour" ( I've recently picked up a copy ofi Blair's biography).

From memory she was in trouble in the polls until the Falklands war whipped up patrotic sentiment. And it seems that from this she figured out her approach to every other problem. Torpedo first and ask questions later.

The privatisations that followed were effectively state give aways. And who is not going to vote for the party that gives them stuff. However post the privatization little actually changed on the ground (I was actually a BT employee in the 80s.). In fact from personal experience things seemed to get worse with "buy British" mandates (are ICL still around). So annocdotally it seemed to be smoke and mirrors.

The mines were probably doomed in the long run - but what was achieved by destroying the mining communities other than bostering her politically ?

In Ireland we went from legitimate attempt at political solutions to "criminalization". With the polical door firmly closed the early 80s saw degeneration into the hopelessness. She was the greatest recuitent tool the republican movement ever had. However again history has a sense of humour and the impact of the hunger strikes politicized the issues again leading at least one hand holding a ballot and so eventually and torturously to the peace process. Need her and the Tories removed from power before it could progress beyond a temporary ceasefire.

Her economic legacy is grim and we are living with its effects to this day. Deregulation, and "the share owning society" was a myth that disguised the economic lost decade of the 80s.

As she said herself, she was not a consensus politican. She needed a war - somewhere, anywhere and would put in work to provoke one and damn the consequences. The Falklands, the miners, the IRA, the public sector, local government, to name the ones that come to mind. Which made sense if you think there is "no such thing as society. I do wonder if things might have been different if she had not been opposed head on and would have had to rationalise her approach without an enemy de jour.

But most of all she and Reagan shifted the political discussion and led "New Labour" to fight over nuanced variations center right policies in the decades since. Much as Reagan achieved in the US with the "Reagan Democrats". It's funny now because in the US the effect has left Reagan looking like a moderate.

karma_

LordSutch wrote: »

Good post Vivienne, and I just made one adjustment for you in your 1st sentence.

I was actually working in Dublin at the time of the hunger strikes in 1981 (1st job) and I can assure you that Ireland and the Irish were split down the middle as to their opinions on Mrs Thatcher. In my Dublin office & my surroundings everybody would have been very pro Thatcher re her stance against the IRA and the hunger strikers, but I was also totally aware of the black flags in some South Dublin estates where the hunger strikers & the PIRA were supported and Thatchers name was dirt!

Well you seem to forget that here in the North things were very different. Nationalists and Republican, moderates and all were crying out for her to do something to reach an agreement on the Hunger strikers. She paid no heed and doomed us all to at the very least another decade of terrible violence. I have no doubt the troubles could have been stopped in the early eighties. Damn, she even ended up making the concessions the Hunger strikers wanted but by then it was too late and she handed the IRA probably it's biggest propaganda coup.

Vivienne23

Thanks for that correcting lord , something I should have spotted myself ! To be honest the more I read about her I would have been pro thatcher had I been around , what it must be like to have a decisive leader , if we had the Iron Lady heading into the eu/IMF talks I'd sleep in peace at night just knowing the job would be done !

pgmcpq

Vivienne23 wrote: »

Been reading this thread with great interest , also doing a bit of googling on why the Irish hate Mrs. Thatcher

There is a bit more to it than that. interesting as it is this thread is not a substitute for reading a bit of history of the period. From my perspective she closed off any political progress in Northern ireland. Interaction with Dublin was not a substitute. With political progress stalled the alternative was tragic but inevitable.

Also it is worth pointing out she's not eactly beloved in Britian either. Try finding message boards fromnorthern England or Scotland for their reaction.

Happyman42

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

You'd swear Thatcher was the one planting bombs.

And this is the naive bull**** you hear from the misinformed. She may not have planted any bombs but her policies vey definately meant that people died all over Ireland and the UK.

karma_

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

See this is the sort of bull **** opinion that makes me sad for humanity. You'd swear Thatcher was the one planting bombs.

Sad for humanity? I lived through the 80's and remember all too well what it was like.

Perhaps you'd care to cease your pathetic little sound-bytes of mundanity and offer something a little more substantial than a below par daily mail headline once in a while?

Better still, before you admonish others for their lack of humanity you might consider not thanking posts mocking desecration and vandalism of graves as it appears contradictory to the stance you appear to be taking here.

Iwasfrozen

Happyman42 wrote: »

And this is the naive bull**** you hear from the misinformed. She may not have planted any bombs but her policies vey definately meant that people died all over Ireland and the UK.

No the people who killed people very definitely meant people in Ireland and the UK died.