Margaret Thatcher Passes away.

[freddie*rooster]

Not a bad innings at the age of 87yrs.

[purple.cow]

That's what apartheid held in check no matter how cruel it was to the many, and how much many of us opposed it's reasoning.

So, the black children forced to work in the vineyards who were paid in alcohol were holding in check multiple murders.  Is that right?  

You can twist anything around if it suits your cause, or you're plain ignorant of the true facts.

They just happen to be that the alcohol was because the parents wanted to drink it because of their own alcohol issues, and it was them that forced their kids to do the work they were supposed to have done.

You have similar issues here in Australia but you choose to ignore them and you also choose to ignore the real plight of Australia's aboriginals, but someone like you tends to only pick on things they want to stir up while shoving their heads in the sand over things closer to home.

There is nothing new in anything when you know the REAL stories instead of picking up on other people's propaganda used for their own ends.

[polksaladallie]

Nikki Savva did a good story on Thather v Gillard this morning.

:^O

[purple.cow]

So, the black children forced to work in the vineyards

You clearly don't understand Africanism in its broad sense.

If you did you would know that no black MAN would ever consider working the fields as it is seen as being beneath them, and no black WOMAN will work them if they have children to do it for them, especially when they have alcoholic issues, but both the male and female will expect the rewards of the child's labours to be handed over to them as their right, be it money or alcohol.

You also appear to be thinking as a typical outsider with no true understanding of cultural issues within another country/peoples.

Black Africa is tribal, always has been, always will be, and this means death to members of one tribe by another for something that streches back a hundred years or more.

I.E. all Zulu hate all Matabele with a vengence and vice versa. It's a simple historical fact.

And if you think the blackman is so downtrodden you haven't bothered taking into consideration issues such as the SWAPO crossing the northern borders into SA to rape, torture and murder perfectly innocent whites and blacks alike just for simple gratification, money, pure evil intent, and yet again, ALCOHOL.

Two members of my own family perished due to such actions, both females, both raped multiple times, both hacked apart as sport.

I do not hold that against all African blacks though, in fact I have always considered certain blacks to be very close friends, even as family.

[windrake]

:^O

.

Do u have a problem?

[polksaladallie]

.

Do u have a problem?

Just had a look - No  😐

[windrake]

I thought the article by Nikki Savva was a good comparison of just how women in the top job conduct themselves & do the hard work re keeping the country on an prosperous pathway to the future.

Another story I read this morning was by Brendon O'Niel who is a UK journalist & would know a lot more of the history of the Thatcher years than many on here.

I was in Spain at the time of the strikes & met some miners & their wives & we talked about the strikes & they agreed that the coal mining industry was in decline & they couldn't see any future in it in the UK any more.

The also said that the Labor party in the UK had closed more mines than Thatcher & that these present closures were no surprise. They were heartsick but eager to face the future in another industry.

They also talked about the iron grip of the unions who manipulated many workers beyond their capacity to endure.

I suggested they emigrate to Australia & they were seriously considering it.

As a partner of a mining industry executive I know that mines have a shelf life & when that is exhausted it's time to move on. Anybody who knows the mining industry understood the closures & saw the unions grip being weakened.

This is the real anger that has simmered in the UK for years, She broke the unions, destroyed their iron grip on the economy & progress, once power is lost it leaves a deep & abiding anger until the one's who wielded that power are overtaken by a new generation.

The UK was in serious decline & Thatcher dragged it kicking & screaming into a prosperous future & the cowardly men behind her saw their chance & removed her but not before she won 3 elections, extended their majority & saw the end of the Comunist grip on Eastern Europe.

Her biggest mistake was the poll tax that the people hated & would not accept, much like the carbon Tax Ms Gillard foisted on Australians without a mandate.

The pale praise Ms Gillard uttered was not about Thatchers achievements but how she was a woman. Thatcher will be remembered as the 2nd Greatest prime minister the UK has ever had.

[lakeland27]

  'The UK was in serious decline & Thatcher dragged it kicking & screaming into a prosperous future'

i just thought i'd point out this for the myth it is. check out the current situation, if that is her legacy then she's best seen for what she really was, just another Tory with short-term  fixes and no genuine long term solutions  .

[polksaladallie]

Didnt she introduce "economic rationalism"?. 

A policy which USA and Australia copied and which failed big time in all countries.

[katydidthat]

Lakeland, you're right ... her legacy has been a sad one.  A very sad one.  And Blair was too gutless to change many of her policies.  

Moorna, please keep talking.  You bring back wonderful memories of rallies in Trafalgar Square and meetings outside the South African High Commission in Canberra, and of Freda, and Guy and Andrew ... and it's *truly* awesome (insert eye rolling smilie here, please) to read such generalisations about Black people in South Africa.  

[monman12]

"just another Tory with short-term  fixes and no genuine long term solutions"

 "The European single currency is bound to fail, economically, politically and indeed socially, though the timing, occasion and full consequences are all necessarily still unclear." .

Trade union reforms:  ending the closed shop and secondary picketing, and introducing strike ballots. Lifting exchange controls and the privatisation programme including British Telecom and the utilities. Liberalising the stock market and opening the doors to a wave of fresh ideas and capital from overseas.

"short-term  fixes" ?

And not a mention in her speeches of bad bad misogynists