Nic Dempsey

Last week was mostly about the benefit cuts that the Govt are implementing. This Govt in a very real way are heirs to Thatcher and on Monday she died. She was the first female prime minster and her legacy is undeniable although we could argue about whether it was beneficial. That, paired with me spending two days out with another migraine, means that most of these links are about her…

1) This is what Hugo Young wrote about her in 1990, just after she resigned and I was surprised at how well it held up.

She was strong, but put excessive weight on strength. She accumulated more personal power than any peacetime prime minister in history and in that guise will interest the constitutional historians for many years. But she saw too little value in the art of compromise. Leadership, for her, was equated too often with the satisfaction of her will. How often, when challenged with being overmighty, did she deride the notion of a leader who gave precedence to other virtues than strength. She was a conviction politician, but too often scorned the reasoned statement of different convictions, sometimes by her closest colleagues. Argument she relished, as long as she won, but persuasion she neglected. Give-and-take and the other techniques of sweet reason were alien to her nature. This made for abrasive and often decisive government, but it was fatally disabling for any kind of collective leadership. For surprisingly many years, it wrought no lasting damage.

2) Margaret Thatcher and misapplied death etiquette.

But the key point is this: those who admire the deceased public figure (and their politics) aren’t silent at all. They are aggressively exploiting the emotions generated by the person’s death to create hagiography. Typifying these highly dubious claims about Thatcher was this (appropriately diplomatic) statement from President Obama: “The world has lost one of the great champions of freedom and liberty, and America has lost a true friend.” Those gushing depictions can be quite consequential, as it was for the week-long tidal wave of unbroken reverence that was heaped on Ronald Reagan upon his death, an episode that to this day shapes how Americans view him and the political ideas he symbolized. Demanding that no criticisms be voiced to counter that hagiography is to enable false history and a propagandistic whitewashing of bad acts, distortions that become quickly ossified and then endure by virtue of no opposition and the powerful emotions created by death. When a political leader dies, it is irresponsible in the extreme to demand that only praise be permitted but not criticisms.

3) Stan Collymore expresses my feelings about Mrs Thatcher perfectly

Do i believe she was a patriot? Yes.

Do i believe she was evil? No.

Do i believe that as Prime Minister she had the interests of all Britons at heart? No.

Her legacies ? She left Britain without equality. She left Britain a more selfish place. She killed off British Industry . She left Britain with an over reliance on financial markets. She killed the notion of camaraderie and community in Britain. She left many wealthier financially but many more poorer financially and morally

4) I find myself agreeing with Peter Oborne. Goodness what is the world coming to.

State occasions can only work if they bring the British people together as a nation. Most Conservatives will feel comfortable with Lady Thatcher’s funeral arrangements. But what about the many people who suffered terribly during the Thatcher years? Welsh miners or workers from the shattered manufacturing centres of northern England are every bit as British

5) Russell Brand as ever writes beautifully.

She would appear in public to drape a hankie over a model BA plane tailfin because she disliked the unpatriotic logo with which they’d replaced the union flag (maybe don’t privatise BA then), or to shuffle about some country pile arm in arm with a doddery Pinochet and tell us all what a fine fellow he was. It always irks when rightwing folk demonstrate in a familial or exclusive setting the values that they deny in a broader social context. They’re happy to share big windfall bonuses with their cronies, they’ll stick up for deposed dictator chums when they’re down on their luck, they’ll find opportunities in business for people they care about. I hope I’m not being reductive but it seems Thatcher’s time in power was solely spent diminishing the resources of those who had least for the advancement of those who had most. I know from my own indulgence in selfish behaviour that it’s much easier to get what you want if you remove from consideration the effect your actions will have on others. 

What have you read this week? Please leave any links in the comments!