Vindication !

There is something surreal in the scenes that followed the announcement that Baroness Margaret Thatcher ( 87 ), a former British prime minister had died of a stroke.   The news cameras  showed people dancing in the streets in some parts of Britain, lighting bonfires and waving signs that denigrated this woman in the strongest terms.   It is likely that there will be similar protests when her body is taken through the streets of London on a gun carriage.   She has been granted a public funeral - which will be attended by the Queen - at a cost of $ 20 million to the public purse.

Margaret Thatcher was certainly a very tough lady.  She took the country to war when Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands and during her term as prime minister she orchestrated vast changes to the way Britain worked and lived.   In particular, she was confronted with hundreds of small and inefficient coal mines from a previous century which provided work for thousands of miners in areas of the country that offered few other jobs.   She was quite ruthless in battling the unions head on and closing these pits, and as a consequence she presided over a huge spike in unemployment.   She also cut back on the welfare state, resulting in lasting fury from those with left wing political views.

As is usual in politics, the results of her decisions will be viewed differently by different people.  Most - however grudgingly - will concede that Britain was in a parlous financial state when she came to power. She earned the sobriquet of " the iron lady " by implementing policies that past prime ministers had consigned to the " too hard basket ".   She completely revised the coal industry in Britain and put the economy on a firm footing.   She did this at the expense of great pain and dislocation for many ordinary people - and it is for this that some refuse to grant her pardon.

Perhaps the ultimate vindication came long after her term ended, when Labor swept to power under prime minister Tony Blair.    It called itself " New Labor " - and if did absolutely nothing to reverse the decisions that Margaret Thatcher had imposed on the nation.   Both sides of politics - excluding the " Looney Left " - conceded that she had done what was necessary to save Britain from oblivion as a world class country.   The present British prime minister concedes that she " saved Britain " !

That will do nothing to still the rage that will impel some people to demonstrate as her gun carriage rolls through British streets, but those with broader thinking minds will look to other countries that failed to produce a leader with the courage to tackle the unpopular problems that were taking their economies ever downward.

There - but for Margaret Thatcher - would have been a Britain joining the likes of Greece, Spain and Portugal in the dismal conditions their populations are facing today !