In terms of zealotry and impact Thatcher was like a 20th century Oliver Cromwell...

and at least after Cromwell died we got to dig up his bones and have him hung, drawn and quartered.

...if we are not to have this happy public spectacle this time then at least we should be thankful, I suppose, that unlike Cromwell, Thatcher was not followed into power by her offspring.

Because those were the people who dug Cromwell up, y'see? Never had you pegged as one of those, tbh, but you live and learn.

Or perhaps you're just historically and ideologically illiterate?

I wonder which. :rubchin:

Expensive funeral. Why not keep it private.

At least she never made out she like everyone unlike them.

I think it's basically just the reactionary/contrarian nature of the british people.

Fundamentally we lack imagination but give us something to kick against and we're as happy as pigs in ****.

Now they mostly just restrict their creativity to things they can either fry or stab.

HQK&R is at least right on that score. Thatcher was very much heir to that slightly dour, humourless, protestant/non-conformist radical tradition of parsimony, continence and duty that, while it is not the most attractive facet of the English people, is the bit that actually gets sh*t done.

See also the abolition of the slave trade; the industrial revolution; birth of the labour movement, etc, etc, etc.

She divided a lot of people

Henry VIII now - he did divide a lot of people.

manifestation of patriotism.

I'm no fan of imperialism, chauvinism or aggressive warmongery but I don't hate my own country. On the contrary.

And anyway, in terms of Wilberforce and the Labour Movement, I'm pretty sure Thatch would have dismissed both as 'wets' and naieve idealists.

She was more fond of the Burkean/Hobbsean than she was Thomas Paine.

Just saying some love her and some hate get. But at least unlike modern.politicans you knew where she stood

But the idea of familiarity breeding contempt probably holds fairly true there.

I still think we good country at heart

They become

He was a proper king b. He would have been at home in Game of Thrones

Michael Corleone put it quite well although I forget exactly how.

Generally, there has to be a pragmatic principle at work or it won't happen (although the abolition of slavery is the major exception, being probably the first time in history a nation has acted against its own perceived interests simply because it believed it was right to do so).

it is that you can kill anyone"

At least as dangerous as patriotism imo. Basically it's a licence for powerful countries to bully weaker ones on spurious grounds. Liberal humanitarians, laptop bombadiers - ugh.

No. The one I mean was to do with being embarrassed about wealth, as a ploy to fool the poor.

:hide:

I'd prefer Enlightenment European if we're chucking labels around, not that's necessarily helpful.

I cant help the country I was raised in and am not really blessed with the social mobility that would perhaps make a move abroad that easy. Though, if the whole implosion of the financial hadnt have happened I would probably making a hash of living in Spain or Ireland right now.

And some of us are right.

Although perhaps that's just housewives for you.

or those tiny few who benefitted from the fall of communism so massively that they ended up as rich as croesus.

Which often relates to extremities.

If we represent anything politically it is the ability to achieve peaceful and gradual reform at apprriate points. It is precisely that ability which avoids the need for genuinely 'radical' reform.

In other words it gets done just very, very slowly.

And carpet bombing.

And how best to avoid sniper fire.

And how there's no such thing as an alcohol ban when British reporters and FCO bigwigs are around.

Mopeds. Coffee outside. Ciao!

Mussolini.