Thatcher Dies

[Alf Bentley]

I don't think many lib dem voters will abandon them, we saw in Eastleigh that where the lib dem local government was popular they retained their seat. What we will see is the protest voters moving to another party (UKIP) and the labour voters who were fed up with Blair/Brown going back to their party.

Even in Eastleigh, where the Lib Dems were strong locally, their vote share fell from 46.5% to 32%. If they lose that many votes nationwide, they'll lose a lot of seats. It's not everywhere that Labour will have no serious presence, the Tories will select a duff candidate and lose as many votes as them, and UKIP will take that many votes (& still fall just short)...

[ADK]

Even in Eastleigh, where the Lib Dems were strong locally, their vote share fell from 46.5% to 32%. If they lose that many votes nationwide, they'll lose a lot of seats. It's not everywhere that Labour will have no serious presence, the Tories will select a duff candidate and lose as many votes as them, and UKIP will take that many votes (& still fall just short)...

Even in Eastleigh, where the Lib Dems were strong locally, their vote share fell from 46.5% to 32%. If they lose that many votes nationwide, they'll lose a lot of seats. It's not everywhere that Labour will have no serious presence, the Tories will select a duff candidate and lose as many votes as them, and UKIP will take that many votes (& still fall just short)...

That was in a by-election where protest votes tend to be higher.

I don't doubt the lib dems will lose seats at the next election but they will still take a significant amount of the popular vote.

[Alf Bentley]

That was in a by-election where protest votes tend to be higher.

I don't doubt the lib dems will lose seats at the next election but they will still take a significant amount of the popular vote.

Time will tell, and the Lib Dem vote nationally usually rises a bit at general elections, due to greater exposure.

UKIP are unlikely to get 28% in many seats at a general election, as they did at the Eastleigh byelection, but that could be bad news for the Lib Dems - I'm sure UKIP voters come from all parties and none, but probably disproportionately from the Tories, who would probably have taken Eastleigh if it hadn't been for UKIP. If I'm right about that - and UKIP doesn't make a major breakthrough, the Lib Dems could lose a lot of southern/rural seats to the Tories (as well as a few to Labour)

[Deucalion]

Is she still dead? I can only assume that this thread is continuing because she's been reanimated.

It's only a matter of time.

[Deucalion]

Time will tell, and the Lib Dem vote nationally usually rises a bit at general elections, due to greater exposure.

UKIP are unlikely to get 28% in many seats at a general election, as they did at the Eastleigh byelection, but that could be bad news for the Lib Dems - I'm sure UKIP voters come from all parties and none, but probably disproportionately from the Tories, who would probably have taken Eastleigh if it hadn't been for UKIP. If I'm right about that - and UKIP doesn't make a major breakthrough, the Lib Dems could lose a lot of southern/rural seats to the Tories (as well as a few to Labour)

Do the usual rules about the Lib Dem apply now though?

When Clegg was shining in TV debates, I thought the Lib Dems could do with some blood on their hands. The have that now in spades, they can't play the 'different from the others' card. Surely, if anything, they have had enough exposure now for people to know what they are about, which, as it turns out, is selling out any principle to keep them at least with some semblance of being in government?

[The Doctor]

Is she still dead? I can only assume that this thread is continuing because she's been reanimated.

Well the greek medical "knowledge" was that red-heads turned into vampires upon dying because they had wrongly balanced humours. Which is why we needed to drive a stake woven from garlic through her heart.

[Deucalion]

Well the greek medical "knowledge" was that red-heads turned into vampires upon dying because they had wrongly balanced humours. Which is why we needed to drive a stake woven from garlic through her heart.

[Guest Bilo]

Was Maggie T a natural ginger or was it out of the bottle?

Anybody who knows if the curtains matched the drapes is either dead or traumatised surely.

[Deucalion]

Was Maggie T a natural ginger or was it out of the bottle?

Anybody who knows if the curtains matched the drapes is either dead or traumatised surely.

Now could be a good time to find out.

[Guest MattP]

Was Maggie T a natural ginger or was it out of the bottle?

Anybody who knows if the curtains matched the drapes is either dead or traumatised surely.

I bet she was an absolute demon in bed.

[Deucalion]

I bet she was an absolute demon in bed.

Narr, missionary only.

Remember, the lady's not for turning.

[Guest Bilo]

I bet she was an absolute demon in bed.

She was played in a BBC drama a couple of years back by this lady.

Who also did this....

Therefore, in my mind, young Margaret Thatcher was filth.

I need to wank less.

[Alexikokopops]

She was played in a BBC drama a couple of years back by this lady.

Who also did this....

Therefore, in my mind, young Margaret Thatcher was filth.

I need to wank less.

I used old Margaret Thatcher to keep the wolf from the door (so to speak) on Monday. No joke. It wasn't even intentional. Clearly the amount of coverage stuck in my head. Afterwards I felt pretty good (for obvious reasons) before the inevitable feeling of shame crept over me. Still, a fitting tribute I think.

I haven't told my girlfriend yet. She's from a mining family and I'm not sure how she'd take me thinking of our Maggie (for whatever reason) during bedroom gymnastics. I not sure if she pops onto Foxestalk either. Here's hoping she doesn't.

[21st Century Fox]

[flowwolf]

I felt sorry for Nick Clegg.

He was put in a position where he either would lose the respect of his party or the respect of the country.

:D And ended up losing both..

[Guest Bilo]

I used old Margaret Thatcher to keep the wolf from the door (so to speak) on Monday. No joke. It wasn't even intentional. Clearly the amount of coverage stuck in my head. Afterwards I felt pretty good (for obvious reasons) before the inevitable feeling of shame crept over me. Still, a fitting tribute I think.

I haven't told my girlfriend yet. She's from a mining family and I'm not sure how she'd take me thinking of our Maggie (for whatever reason) during bedroom gymnastics. I not sure if she pops onto Foxestalk either. Here's hoping she doesn't.

You old romantic dog you.

If the young Maggie T looked like Andrea Riseborough, she's going in the wank bank.

Going to hell and I don't care.

[Guest MattP]

Now this thread has picked up a bit.

[isaidno]

This song is heading for number 1 on sunday, currently number 2 in the I tunes chart

[Daggers]

Although Mr Scargill has not commented publicly on his former adversary's death, Mr Capstick, himself a former miner, told ITV about his reaction.

"I'd been talking to Arthur some 10 minutes earlier so I sent him a text message, a very short one, just said 'Thatcher dead'," he said. "I received one almost instantly saying 'Scargill alive!' and he's very much alive."

[Guest Foxin_mad]

She made mistakes yes, like all politicians, anyone who think Labour were or could do better is a first rate idiot.

Its not likr Labour changed the policies from 1997 but all Labourites act like they are good Socialists, while sipping on their champage going to Havistock. Fact is Socialism is crap, one step up from Communism I can not think of a Socialist Country that is half decent to live in. Look at France, Italy, Spain, Green all mad lazy socialists all utterley screwed. We will probably suffer the same fate when the idiotic clueless electorate of this country vote for Militwat in 2015.

Remember the Good time under Labour.

[Daggers]

Yes. Let's point and laugh at those stupid people from Green.

[I am Rod Hull]

I noticed the headline in the local paper when i popped down the shop earlier and it said "South Derbyshire pays tribute to Thatcher"

I pointed this out to the middle aged Brummie lady on the till saying "I bet your beer sales are up this week".

I just got a funny look and a "oi loiked her"

[inckley fox]

She made mistakes yes, like all politicians, anyone who think Labour were or could do better is a first rate idiot.

Its not likr Labour changed the policies from 1997 but all Labourites act like they are good Socialists, while sipping on their champage going to Havistock. Fact is Socialism is crap, one step up from Communism I can not think of a Socialist Country that is half decent to live in. Look at France, Italy, Spain, Green all mad lazy socialists all utterley screwed. We will probably suffer the same fate when the idiotic clueless electorate of this country vote for Militwat in 2015.

Remember the Good time under Labour.

Is this serious? Spain has a Conservative government which is currently mired in the greatest corruption scandal in the country's history. Italy has been ruled by a technocratic government since the collapse of the long-standing ultra-right Berlusconi regime. The economic collapse of 'Green' began under Conservative rule too, with a government which fell apart about three or four years ago. As for France, Hollande has been in power for less than a year after more than a decade of Conservative rule, I hardly think he can be held responsible for their social problems.

[inckley fox]

Yes she's gone but the great good she did for this country lives on for ever more.

It's hard to say what Thatcher's legacy was. The abolition of Borstals, greater access to further education for mature students, decolonialisation with - for example - Rhodesia, 'Right to Buy' (albeit an old Labour idea, and one which left us with a shortage of council housing) and her support for Mandela's release (despite having refused to sanction the apartheid regime) might count as positives.

However her 'great' achievements - or the things which most die-hard Tories consider to be her great achievements - simply weren't: Deregulation of the banks (widely blamed for the current economic crisis), the Falklands (the potential invasion of which she had ignored for years before it actually happened and cost nearly a thousand lives), her mighty Monetarist policy (which inherited inflation at 10%, left it at 10%, oversaw two economic collapses with a third just two years after she left office, and saw employment figures higher than the preceding Labour government through most of her reign) and the crushing of the miners (which damaged our country's productivity for the next thirty years).

I'm not politically partisan, so I'll leave out the collapse in our education system, our health service, the social unrest, the poll tax, the scattergun censorship policies, the support of Pinochet, her ineffective policies in Ireland and the shameful response to Hillsborough.

Neither am I a Blairite (not by far) but his government wasn't as disastrous as true blues would like us to think, just as the Major government wasn't as appalling as a Socialist might think. The improvements (as assessed by independent international bodies) to our public services such as education and the Labour-created NHS after 1997, the two million people taken out of poverty between 1997 and 2007, the breakthrough in the Ireland situation (thanks, also, to Major who had acknowledged the shortfalls of Thatcher's Irish policy) in 1998 and the minimum wage at least go some way to making up for his haphazard welfare policies, student loan schemes and appalling foreign policy decisions.

I won't celebrate the death of a woman, no matter how little compassion she had for her people, who gave her life to doing what she felt best for her country. She gave her all in undertaking a vital job, she just wasn't all that good at it. Her being dead doesn't mean we should all open those champagne bottles bought back in the early eighties, but neither does it mean she should suddenly be elevated to the height of a competent leader.

[inckley fox]

It's through the niavety of Attlee and his post war government that we are now saddled with a welfare state that is the laughing stock of the world. I'm sure he would turn in his grave if he could see what his well meaning but ultimately futile effort to trust in the honesty and goodness of the average man.

Lets face it he could not have got much wrong after coming out of a world war. New housing had to be built which produced plenty of employment and a general air of looking forward to the future. Lucky for him he did not live to see the abject shambles that the present modern welfare is. I'm sure he would brake down in tears at the sight of Philpott and all the rest of the scrounging benifit scum that to this day live off the back of his niavity.

I think you'll find most European nations have a similar welfare state based, in many cases, on our model.

Having looked back over your arguments you appear to be blaming our welfare state for our lack of social mobility. There's some truth in that, especially when people can profit from having children instead of working. The risk is that you simply keep the poor alive, in order not to have them living on your streets and dying all over the place. This was what the likes of Orwell warned against in both 'Down and Out' and a couple of essays.

However improved vocational education, a penal system which ensures rehabilitation and well-funded social services which are equipped to take and effectively take care of children born to inadequate parents are all measures which have been shown to improve social mobility; whereas cuts to education, rehabilitation programmes and social services are not.

As for 'Attlee couldn't have got much wrong coming out of a world war' - well, one look at our response to World War One, or France's, or Germany's, or Italy's, or America's, should put that argument to bed.