Maggie is Dead.

[Talkinpeace]

at last.

[FreedomOfTheTess]

I won't speak ill of the dead.

However I disagree with her having a funeral mainly paid for by the state. I certainly don't want MY taxes to pay a jot towards her funeral.

Let her supporters cough up the money if they really think she was so great.

[HesterShaw]

My thoughts exactly. And if they are worried about disruption and protest why make such a provocative gesture as a semi state funeral? It's a slap in the face for many communities up and down the land. No other prime minister has had this except Churchill and he led the country through WW2. No comparison.

[claig]

She deserves a state funeral because of her huge historical significance. She is a worldwide figure and one of the leading worldwide figures of the entire twentieth century. She represented our country and her name is known worldwide. Whether you agree or disagree with her, she is a towering figure that represented Britain and who will be remembered and written about for centuries. That is why she deserves to be commemorated by her country with the highest honour possible.

Heffer has an article on it in the Daily Mail. He says:

'Our nation pays no higher tribute to its great men and women than to accord them a state funeral. There have been only 12 for commoners in 427 years: men such as Nelson, Wellington, Gladstone and Churchill, names that will forever resonate in our history.'

'When you see the other names on the list of men ? and they are all men ? who have had state funerals, few actually hold a candle to Lady Thatcher.

The last before Churchill, in 1935, was Sir Edward Carson, who was largely responsible for the creation of Northern Ireland, and a figure so divisive in his time that he makes Lady Thatcher seem like Nelson Mandela.

Before Carson, in 1928, was Earl Haig, under whose direction 20,000 men died and 40,000 more were wounded on the first day of the Somme, and who was hardly uncontroversial either.'

[claig]

Heffer's article in full

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2306020/Margaret-Thatcher-state-funeral-backlash-It-insult-history-deny-honour.html

[FreedomOfTheTess]

Her huge historical significance?

What destroying the heart and soul of the country and turning us into a nation of selfish NIMBYs?!

If you think she deserves a state funeral, you and her other supporters should cough up, not people like me who despised her.

[claig]

Who across the world knows of Sir Edward Carson or Earl Haig. These figures pale into insignificance when compared with Margaret Thatcher, the first woman Prime Minister of this country, and a person that will be studied and written about for hundreds of years and who was instrumental in shaping world events and ending the Cold War that was a large part of the twentieth century and which affected billions of people on this earth.

Great figures in history only come along rarely. THat is why they need to be honoured for what they did.

[claig]

'What destroying the heart and soul of the country and turning us into a nation of selfish NIMBYs?!'

What have New Labour policies got to do with this?

She resurrected us as a country when we were known as "the sick man of Europe", when there were regular strikes and our industries were uncompetitive with the rest of the world. She created social mobility so that ordinary working people gained access to jobs that had previously been earmarked only for those public school boys wearing bowler hats.

She shaped international events and influenced all our lives. She worked tirelessly for this country and as we have heard often stayed up all night. She was dedicated to this country and its people and she fought the elites in order to make it a more egalitarian country where opportunity was open to all.

Some Labour politicians have said that she was a "towering figure" and that is exactly why the country should honour her with teh greatest honour.

There won't be another "towering figure" for decades if not centuries, giants walk the earth all too rarely. She was a giant, a colossus. She herself said "the Mummy has returned" and everyone knew what she meant. For a figure of such magnitude, nothing but a state funeral will do.

[FreedomOfTheTess]

Ah you see, you think she's a great figure of history, but millions of us don't.

I certainly don't think she'll be a famous historical figure in say, 200 years time, whereas those like Nelson, Wellington and Churchill will be.

[FreedomOfTheTess]

I may be wrong, but you seem to assume I'm a Labour voter - I'm not - I vote independent. I have no time for any of the main parties.

And you say she fought the elites, but my God, that is what she became and how she saw herself.

Who can forget the "we have become a grandmother," moment? Who speaks like that?

Answer: someone who thinks they are better than everyone else.

And also, someone who isn't elite, doesn't die living in the Ritz!

[FreedomOfTheTess]

And my final comment claig - you clearly worship the ground she walked on - and thus you prove my point, that you and others who worship her so, should be the ones paying for her funeral.

Leave the rest of us out of it.

[claig]

'Ah you see, you think she's a great figure of history, but millions of us don't.'

But Kissinger, Obama, Shimon Peres, Gorbachev and leaders of every country have acknowledged and respected her enormous siginificance. The Queen will attend the funeral. To call her a legend is to undervalue her contribution to this country and the world.

In centuries to come, history books will talk of the Cold War and they will mention how Communism ended and how the Berlin Wall that divided the German nation fell. And at the heart of it all, there was a woman called Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of Great Britain.

She will never be forgotten and what she did will never fade from memory. She was a legend, and legends are told for centuries. She represented us, the millions of citizens of Great Britain on the world stage. We lived through those times and she affected every one of our lives. She is one of the tallest giants and that is why she deserves the highest honour.

[claig]

'Who can forget the "we have become a grandmother," moment? Who speaks like that?'

Legends speak like that.

[claig]

'And also, someone who isn't elite, doesn't die living in the Ritz!'

She stayed in the Ritz as a guest of the Barclay brothers who respected her as the legend that she is.

[claig]

'And my final comment claig - you clearly worship the ground she walked on'

I don't worship her. I think she got some things wrong. But I know a legend when I see one and I respect greatness and that is why I would like a state funeral for one of the greatest figures in twentieth century world history.

[HesterShaw]

Claig, I'm afraid you sound a little unhinged. Sorry.

[claig]

Only a little?

They say we read "rags", they say we are "unhinged" if we respect Thatcher. But the milliosn are not "unhinged" in their respect for Thatcher.

[claig]

Some of them say Thatcher was "unhinged" too. The shameless scoundrels!

[Chipstick10]

Claig you are wasting your breath on here. Even ken livingstone can appreciate her historical significance. Why people cannot appreciate that I do not know. The queen is reversing years of protocol to attend her funeral. Of course she should have a full ceremonial funeral, how people cannot see it is beyond me. It's nonsense for the sake of bloody mindededness. No one is asking anyone to lover her now in death,but to just honour her place in history.

[claig]

Exactly, Chipstick10.

She served our country and we should honour great servants of our country and our people, and to quibble about the cost of honouring her is shameful for a great country such as ours.

[niceguy2]

+1 to tiggy

[ipadquietly]

All these articles eulogising her are making me feel quite ill.

She created all these fat cat bosses we love to moan about, by privatising service and utility industries.

People bought their council houses for tuppence ha'penny and then sold them at market price, thus fuelling price increases.

Because of her, we have to have a maths degree to work out the cheapest route when we want to go somewhere on a train.

And all the rest of it.......

But, like any politician - she knew she was right!

A big ceremonial funeral? Paid by the tax payer? That also makes me feel quite ill.

[Unami]

Very few people have the patience to retread the detailed economic arguments for and against Thatcher's policies. But what is more apparent is the zeal and the ruthlessness and at points the apparent pleasure with which she pursued these policies - and it's her haughty, cruel, uncaring rhetoric that still draws the most ire, I think.

Sometimes I feel that if I provide enough evidence then even her supporters will begin to understand where she went wrong, and how misguided and damaging her political approach was. But then off the wall comments like Claigs remind me that her supporters are fervent ideologues, with a bizarre banal devotion to MT and a frothy fantasy about Britain on the world stage. I truly hope you are joking, Claig, because I worry for your health otherwise.

[HesterShaw]

I don't deny she was a historical figure at all! Just because someone is not a rabid Thatcher-eulogiser, doesn't make them into some ignorant Trot . I repeat yet again you don't either lump people into Thatcher or New Labour supporters. Some people vote for other candidates entirely. Yes, imagine that!


And what I think the eulogisers are forgetting is the people whose lives she screwed over are still alive and the communities still messed up today. To compare her legacy to Churchill's is ludicrous - he was a figure who inspired this country to hold on and sit tight and stand firm until the Americans joined the war to help us out. But even Churchill had his detractors - the people in Tonypany, for example, who he pretty much ordered troops to fire on during their demonstration. I doubt many of them were weeping at his funeral.

Having this jamboree for her is provocative. Ordering football and rugby crowds to observe a minute's silence is ludicrous and insulting. The 80s was not long ago. Why on earth SHOULD they observe a minute's silence for her? This will backfire spectacularly and merely give the Conservative party and their supporters another reason to despise the lower orders and brand them as reds with no morals or respect. Just bury her quietly with the respect she deserves as a dead former politician. She was not some kind of saint.

[BombJack]

All these articles eulogising her are making me feel quite ill.

And all the people on here, hating her simply because their Dads told them to long ago, is making me feel ill.

Well, that's why I hated her at the age of 11 anyway. Everyone did in Wigan, and most still do. Thing is though, when you get to 18, you really should start making your own mind up.

• Take a look at life during the Winter of Discontent, and the actions of the Callaghan government. Look at the Unions. Yes - those are Graveyards being picketed by the way!
  
  
• Examine the decline of the mining industry since 1947 (nationalisation). Look at how many pits had already closed between 1947-1979. The facts & figures are in the public domain.
  
  
• Check out how women were perceived in the late 70's, and how they were viewed by the mining communities. (Imagine going for a drink in a "working men"'s pub in 1979).
  
  
• Check out the records of the negotiations between Buenos Aires & London. Look at how much Thatcher bent over backwards, offering to compromise on virtually everything, to avoid conflict.
  
  
• Take note of how pivotal she was during the fall of Communism. Only Reagan & Karol Wojtyla could compare.
  
  
• Read her full quote on "No such thing as society". She never actually said it, and the way it is being quoted is one of the most heinous lies told about her (one my Dad still trips out all the time, like a stuck record).
  
  

But, like any politician - she knew she was right!

This was her greatest weakness - and led to some policies which can only be described as Lunacy. The Poll tax was the prime example of this.

Still, second only to Churchill in terms of "Greatness". Churchill's quote seems rather apt as well:

"You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life."