Friday, February 16, 2007

The Everyday Life of a Retired Iron Lady

There was a rather poignant profile of Margaret Thatcher and her day to day life in the Daily Mail yesterday by Geoffrey Levy. Click HERE. It ends likes this...
Carol Thatcher tells a moving little story. 'I'm always trying to convince
Mum just how much affection the public still has for her, but she isn't
convinced. And then, in my temporary spell of being a "celeb" (she won last
year's ITV show I'm A Celebrity. .. Get Me Out Of Here!), I was asked to open a
local street fair. It was a lovely summer evening and my mother said: "I want to
come and watch." 'When we arrived, she was greeted with tremendous warmth, a
round of applause, people gathering round taking pictures with their mobiles and
parents telling their small children who she was. 'It was lovely, and Mum was so
excited. She was genuinely chuffed, because when you are out of politics you are
very out. I said to her: "Mum, you are an icon." She replied: "Carol, I think my
place in history is assured."'

Well if it isn't, it ought to be.

19 comments:

Manfarang said...

A place in history assured indeed, as is Admiral Horthy's.

Anonymous said...

Yup, here place as history's number one milk snatcher is very much assured...

Anonymous said...

Even a crabby old leftie like me has to acknowledge that Margaret Thatcher's place in history is assured. She will be remembered as one of the most important Prime Ministers that the UK has ever had, no question about it.

Anonymous said...

I'm sure all the usual suspects will come along and make spiteful comments about her but Baroness T has a deserved place in history.

I consider myself some form of non-aligned 'small s' socialist and find the 'me and only me' culture connected with her period in office revolting BUT she pushed through some essential reforms and freed us from the excesses of the union power.

No-one who's honest with themselves could really want to live in a world where a few militants can bring a nation to a halt.

The economic reform of the country which took place under her was long overdue but clearly there was a lot of pain for many along the way which some are still only just recovering from.

Clearly she'd lost the plot with the Community Charge but she seemed to understand that Government is about doing things and not about a series of media events.

She was also wrong to vandalise London by removing our government. For that reason, and in light of Blair's naked rigging of the selection process, it felt 'right' when Ken Livingstone won the Mayoral election in 2000.

If we think well of her for no other reason, let's contrast her dignified and robust leadership in the wake of the IRA's attempted assassination with Blair's Corporal Jones style 'don't panic' routine of recent years and the hysteria his government tries to foster over the threat of terrorism.

I believe on this issue she had a better understanding of the British people's true character that blair ever will.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

"Carol, I think my
place in history is assured."

It has been assured for virtually all my life, since she smashed the Argentinian junta, broke the Communist miners' union and allowed hard-working taxpayers to keep more of their salaries. The names of Harold Wilson or Jim Callaghan or Ted Heath (except for the EEC) will be forgotten by all but history buffs, but the career of Margaret Hilda Thatcher is already legendary.

kinglear said...

Better to be known for what Thatcher did than for what Bliar hasn't done. Although I suppose Iraq will always be remembered.

Anonymous said...

Maybe she ought to start blogging

Anonymous said...

Bless! But don't you think, just for a moment sometimes in the wee small hours. that the current plight of UK Ltd. - money obsessed, family breakdown, children bottom of child welfare list - started with Mrs T? I know she was an avowed proponent of family values - it's what her 'There's no such thing as society' quote was all about. But she established the foundations for rampant self interest and greed, and a disdain for public institutions, which has - IMO - done damage that it will take generations to undo, assuming that it's even possible to do so.

Guthrum said...

I was never a fan when she was in office, whilst what was done was neccessary, an aweful lot of baby got thrown out with the bath water. I could never understand the hold she had over the Conservative party, until she came to a prize giving and science block opening at my sons school. I am proud to say that he was a prize winner. The speech she gave held everybody, including a lot of small boys, in the palms of her hands. Even for a cynic like me it was a remarkable performance. It was obvious, that she had not been well, however she displayed a humour that I have not seen before that displaced the frailty.
Having said that, both her and Blair have convinced me that two terms is more than enough and that limit ,as in the States, should be imposed before dellusions of infallibility set in. Wishing she was still there after all this time, probably gives some insight into why Blair is clinging on.

Anonymous said...

Blimey! I thought she was dead already. Don't you think there's something unhealthy about craving adulation as much as she obviously does? She obviously has very low self-esteem. But then that's understandable I guess.

thatcher said...

my some other hobbies like glogging might help!

Little Black Sambo said...

Jerryc 9.38
"The current plight of UK Ltd. ... started with Mrs T."
It's a sort of tribute to her to blame her for all this country's ills, but when she came along the destruction of the country was already well under way. A lot of it happened in the 60s

Newmania said...

Iain that is really touching. Carol Thatcher may herself be daft as a brush but she clearly has a great affection for her mother, (and I can only agree with her judgement of her brother)

I have often thought I would like to tell Margaret Thatcher that she is not a spitting image puppet ,to some of us ,and not the butt of a million updated mother-in-law gags ,courtesy of the alternative(to comedy) brigade.

I wondered if she might feel there were few who remembered her especially with the slow drip drip of BBC poison every hour of every day.

I like to think that if she saw the great respect she inspires in this "sphere" it might cheer her up.
A wonderful woman to whom we all owe a great deal. I think I will finally get round to writing that letter of thanks .

neil craig said...

Lovely story & sounds true. Doesn't mean they all liked her but does suggest they all respected her.

Javelin maybe she already does - who would know.

Yak40 said...

The last Conservative PM we're ever likely to see, which is truly depressing.

Fitaloon said...

Mrs T was a great lady and the most influential leader since Churchill.
Love her or loathe her, you still trusted her to tell how it was, and she would NEVER have got up in the HoC and lied about the reasons for going to war. People RESIGNED over the Falklands and she didn't wait until she had left office to allow her peers to judge the decisions taken in that war.
I believe she wrote to everyone of the families who lost someone, and she and the media did not keep the public away from the reality of the casualties of war.
I hope this government and the present day media will one day be ashamed of the way they have treated our injured soldiers and the way they have been hidden from view.
Carol Thatcher is right, she is an icon and the last conviction politician I can remember living at No10. She took the "sick man of Europe" who was turning into a joke and turned us around and made Britain a country respected on the World stage. What does she think of NuLabour and what they have done to the Britain's reputation now, or the way that apathy now rules come the GE?

Anonymous said...

As someone who was trying to bring up a young family in the 70's, I can remember dealing with massive taxation on my husband's very low salary, coping with no electicity (strikes), no rubbish collections (strikes), panic buying (strikes) etc - all fuelled by the greed of trades unionist leaders, eager to flex their Marxist muscles.

Thank heavens for Margaret say I, and one of my proudest moments was meeting her and talking briefly to her - it was in the middle of a massive reception for her after her retirement, hundreds of people were clamouring for her attention, and she focused herself totally on me for much longer than I expected - what a STAR!

CityUnslicker said...

Good to see she still has the wit to get needle Blair with just a single line