The lives of Margaret Thatcher and Margaret North, RIP
My mother died in February, aged 95 and Margaret Thatcher, of course, died in April, aged 87. They were quite a common social type, and rather a fine one. Read more...
Mrs Thatcher.
Mrs Thatcher, Ayn Rand and Bishop Chartres
It's a bit soon to make a proper judgement, but Bishop Chartres seems to have delivered a blinder of a sermon at Mrs thatcher's funeral service. Saying he wasn't going to be political, he was very highly political in an important way. I mean that he laid what looks like a trail between Ayn Rand and Margaret Thatcher. Here's the key sentence (culled from the Daily Mirror's website). It's on spiritual development :
First there is the struggle for freedom and independence and then the self-giving and the acceptance of inter-dependence. Read more...
Mrs Thatcher: good for our souls as well as our wallets?
Several Thatcheristes have been putting the record straight: that she didn't "destroy" the unions but democratised them; that she wasn't a wrecker of manufacturing; that she closed fewer mines and shipyards than Labour had before her. But we have had more challenging arguments, too. They hinge on her failure to crush the welfare state, or the left-liberal elite. That was part of her failure to win hearts... Read more...
Why Mrs Thatcher was hated
Mrs Thatcher was not funny or warm, at least not in public. She wasn't even populist. Unlike The Gipper, it is unlikely that she will ever become a National Treasure. She represented - was like - a very small segment of British society: the lower middle class. Her virtues were those of a stage nanny or governess, as in Mrs Doubtfire, or Mary Poppins, or Anna from The King and I. She was firm, friendly, upbeat, undaunted. She treated us all like children. But above all, she decided that what we all needed was plain speaking.... Read more...
Phew: “Iron Lady” is OK!
The worst charges one can make against the movie Iron Lady don't stand up. I see that her family and close admirers might be angry about it, but the rest of us can probably be glad there's an account of her time in office and life which is broadly fair (and broadly supportive, probably in spite of itself). To the slightly differing but very positive comments by Matthew Parris (in the LA Times) and by Iain Dale in his blog I mostly want to reinforce the latter's sense that this film will help the non-committal see why Mrs T was a force for good. Read more...
Hating Thatcher
Mrs Thatcher was divisive, illiberal, militaristic and thought there was "no such thing as society". Easy to hate the old bitch, then. And wrong. Read more...