Margaret thatcher

The Times has a fascinating interview (£) with former Soviet leader, Nobel Laureate and two-time Man of the Year Mikhail Gorbachev. He strikes an optimistic tone about the future of democracy in Russia, praising the ‘Moscow Spring’ protesters and saying ‘This is the right moment to start creating as part of this new situation a strong democratic party.’ But perhaps the most eye-catching comes when he compares Vladimir Putin with Margaret Thatcher: ‘Mr Gorbachev recalled Mrs Thatcher, Prime Minister at the time, telling him that she was leaving a summit in Paris early to deal with the challenge to her leadership from within the Conservative Party. He said: “I felt

The feeding frenzy over Liam Fox tells us a great deal more about what is wrong with the Conservative Party than it does about Dr. Fox. The Defence Secretary has been an ass. He admits that he allowed “distinctions to be blurred” between his “professional responsibilities and [his] personal loyalties to a friend”. But if someone has known you and counselled you and worked for you over the years it is all but impossible to maintain such distinctions when you are in power. You just have to cut them off, brutally. Fox’s biggest weakness, and one which was well known before this, is that he is too kind. You might

What’s the most important geo-political event of this century? Most people would say 9/11. The Foreign Secretary believes that it is the Arab Spring. But in The Times today (£), Emma Duncan makes a persuasive case for it being the collapse of Lehman Brothers. Duncan argues that Lehman Brothers’ fall has three claims to be an epoch-making event. The first is its contribution to the financial crisis and subsequent economic stagnation. The second is the way that it has catalysed China’s economic rise vis-à-vis the US, with China now predicted to become the world’s largest economy within this decade. The third, the fact that that the economic troubles of the

Internationally renowned policeman Bill Bratton has agreed to advise the government on how to defeat gang culture. Bratton’s role is not official, but he will arrive for duty in the autumn nonetheless. The former LA police chief has already offered a diagnosis of Britain’s problems. In an interview with the Telegraph, he says that hoodlums have been “emboldened” by timid policing and lenient sentencing. Quite what this means for Ken Clarke’s justice policy, supported by the Liberal Democrats, remains to be seen. But the indications are that the government will bolster its law and order policies. Doubtless a wry smile will have broken across the face of Andy Coulson, who

Sarah Palin will be in town soon and she hopes to meet Mrs Thatcher. She told the Sunday Times: “I am going to Sudan in July and hope to stop in England on the way. I am just hoping Mrs Thatcher is well enough to see me as I so admire her.” However, it seems that the admiration is not mutual. The Guardian’s Wintour and Watt blog reports an old ally of the Lady’s saying: “Lady Thatcher will not be seeing Sarah Palin. That would be belittling for Margaret. Sarah Palin is nuts. “Margaret is focusing on Ronald Reagan and will attend the unveiling of the statue (in Grosvenor Square).

Here’s a game of Spot the Difference for you. Compare Nick Clegg’s comments today — “…there are some very strong memories of what life was like under Thatcherism in the 1980s, and somehow a fear that that’s what we’re returning to…” — with the latest shot from The Spectator archives: Can Nick Clegg sing the blues? Fraser Nelson, The Spectator, 13 March 2010 Nick Clegg’s office already has a Downing Street feel to it. Since becoming leader of the Liberal Democrats, he has had it redecorated so that portraits of old party leaders hang on the staircase up to his room, as portraits of former prime minsters do in No.

As you’ve no doubt deduced from the cover image on the left-hand side of this page, the latest Spectator is out today — and it’s a soaraway double issue for Easter. By way of peddling it to CoffeeHousers (buy it here, etc.), I thought I’d mention one article among many. It’s a celebratory list of some of the country’s “most inspiring and influential over-80s,” and it includes tributes to them from some rather notable under-80-year-olds. So we have Matt Ridley on David Attenborough, Alex Salmond on Sean Connery, Ian Rankin on P.D James, and plenty more besides. Anyway, there are two entries that CoffeeHousers might care to see in particular,

Lord Lawson has given George Osborne’s Budget an A-minus. Writing in today’s Times (£), the former chancellor said that his successor ‘got the big questions right’ by sticking to deficit reduction and assisting hard-pressed taxpayers where he could. The only blemish was the carbon price floor for the energy sector, which Lawson describes as ‘nothing less than an anti-growth strategy’.  Also, Lawson warns Osborne against uniting income tax and national insurance. Unsurprisingly, Mrs Thatcher’s great reforming chancellor looked into this measure and is convinced that it is a non-starter. ‘This superficially attractive reform, which is by no means a new idea, was known in the Treasury in my time as

Many political careers have met a torturous end in the Home Office. And this morning, Theresa May began her struggle. She is taking on the “last great unreformed public service” and the opposition is formidable; so much so that the official opposition barely get a look in. The Peelers are marching on Downing Street. The Police Federation has declared itself ‘fed up’ with cuts – a perfunctory warning to the government. Vice Chairman Simon Reed indicated that the Federation feels the government is abrogating its duty of care to those who serve, a dextrous line forged by those opposed to personnel cuts to the armed forces. Reed told the Today

Another Saturday, another interview with Ken Clarke. This time, the bruised bruiser has been talking to the FT and the remarkable thing is that he has managed to say nothing. Not a sausage. Colleagues were not insulted, Middle England escaped unscathed and the European Court of Human Rights wasn’t even mentioned.  But Clarke conveys his determination to fight. He defends his prison reforms and community sentences, to which the right has now applied the grave term ‘misconceived’. Clarke retorts: ‘We are trying to take 23 per cent out of the budget. I don’t recall any government that’s ever tried to make any spending reductions on law and order – let alone 23

Ed Miliband’s speech today contained an interesting compliment to Margaret Thatcher. He said that the challenge for Labour now was to ‘change the common sense of the age’ as the Tories had done in the 1970s. Miliband’s argument is that Labour need to articulate an entirely new political economy. As he put it,’ we can’t build economic efficiency or social justice simply in the way we have tried before.’ What I find interesting about Miliband is that he trying to move the centre ground from opposition, something than no one has done successfully since Thatcher. Both Blair and Cameron moved towards it in opposition and only tried to shift it

Forget the children of Thatcher, here’s what the Americans were saying about the Iron Lady herself when she became Tory party leader. The source is a confidential cable from the American Embassy in London to the US State Department, dated 16 February 1975, and referenced in Claire Berlinski’s book There is No Alternative: Subject: Margaret Thatcher: Some First Impressions 1. We understand Department is providing Secretary with biographic data on Margaret Thatcher prior to his meeting with her February 18, Here are our initial impressions of Britain’s newest political star. 2. Margaret Thatcher has blazed into national prominence almost literally from out of nowhere.  When she first indicated that she