[vision-master]

In this episode of the Keiser Report, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert explore the myth of whether Margaret Thatcher "saved Britain," or gave them a British dream of "striving to mature before your debts do." They look at North Sea oil production, and wonder how big a UK sovereign wealth fund would be today if Thatcher had saved any of the country's oil wealth. In the second half of the show, Max Keiser talks to Jan Skoyles of The Real Asset Company about Bitcoin: Is she bit-curious or bit-con? They also discuss her report released today which asks, who is buying gold? Brazil, Paraguay, China are stacking bail-ins with the people's money in the bank.

[dolanbaker]

Ding Dong the witch is dead!

The song has a very good chance of topping the UK top 40 singles chart this week!

[Graeme]

This is how the Economist views Margaret Thatcher's legacy:

No ordinary politician

SEVERAL prime ministers have occupied 10 Downing Street for as long as, or even longer than, Margaret Thatcher. Some have won as many elections—Tony Blair, for one. But Mrs Thatcher (later Lady Thatcher), Britain’s only woman prime minister, was the first occupant of Number 10 to become an “-ism” in her lifetime. She left behind a brand of politics and a set of convictions which still resonate, from Warsaw to Santiago to Washington.

What were those convictions? In Mrs Thatcher’s case, the quickest way to her political make-up was usually through her handbag. As she prepared to make her first leader’s speech to the Conservative Party conference in 1975, a speechwriter tried to gee her up by quoting Abraham Lincoln:

You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot help the wage-earner by pulling down the wage-payer.

When he had finished, Mrs Thatcher fished into her handbag to extract a piece of ageing newsprint with the same lines on it. “It goes wherever I go,” she told him.

And it was a fair summation of her thinking. Mrs Thatcher believed that societies have to encourage and reward the risk-takers, the entrepreneurs, who alone create the wealth without which governments cannot do anything, let alone help the weak. A country can prosper only by encouraging people to save and to spend no more than they earn; profligacy (and, even worse, borrowing) were her road to perdition. The essence of Thatcherism was a strong state and a free economy.


Judged from the grand historical perspective, Mrs Thatcher’s biggest legacy was the spread of freedom—with the defeat of totalitarianism in its most vicious form in the Soviet Union, and with the revival of a liberal economic tradition that had gone into retreat after 1945.

Her combination of ideological certainty and global prominence ensured that Britain played a role in the collapse of the Soviet Union that was disproportionate to its weight in the world. Mrs Thatcher was the first British politician since Winston Churchill to be taken seriously by the leaders of all the big powers. She was a heroine to opposition politicians in eastern Europe. Her willingness to stand shoulder to shoulder with “dear Ronnie” to block Soviet expansionism helped to promote new thinking in the Kremlin. But her readiness to work with Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet leader, also helped to end the cold war.

economist

Freedom fighter

In her early years in politics, economic liberalism was in retreat, the Soviet Union was extending its empire, and Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek were dismissed as academic eccentrics. In Britain the government hobnobbed with trade unions (“beer and sandwiches in Number 10”), handed out subsidies to failing nationalised industries and primed the pump through Keynesian demand management. To begin with the ambitious young politician went along with this consensus (see article). But the widespread notion that politics should be “the management of decline” made her blood boil. The ideas of Friedman and Hayek persuaded her that things could be different.

Most of this radicalism was hidden from the British electorate that voted her into office in 1979, largely in frustration with Labour’s ineptitude. What followed was an economic revolution. She privatised state industries, refused to negotiate with the unions, abolished state controls, broke the striking miners and replaced Keynesianism with Friedman’s monetarism. The inflation rate fell from a high of 27% in 1975 to 2.4% in 1986. The number of working days lost to strikes fell from 29m in 1979 to 2m in 1986. The top rate of tax fell from 83% to 40%.


For a world in desperate need of growth, this is the wrong direction. Europe will never thrive until it frees up its markets. America will throttle its recovery unless it avoids overregulation. China will not sustain its success unless it starts to liberalise. This is a crucial time to hang on to Margaret Thatcher’s central perception: that for countries to flourish, people need to push back against the advance of the state. What the world needs now is more Thatcherism, not less.

economist

[Beery1]

I went off on a tangent on my bicycling blog this week and took a few minutes to share my take on it:

http://ianbrettcooper.blogspot.com/2013 ... nally.html

"Ding Dong! The Witch is dead.

For those of us working class Britons who had to endure years of class warfare, Thatcher was no hero. I was 9 years old when I got my first taste of Thatcherism, when free school milk for the over sevens was removed in 1971. Edward Short, Labour education spokesman said it was ‘the meanest and most unworthy thing’ he had seen in 20 years.

It got worse from there. Thatcher sold off public businesses, destroyed trade unions and eroded workers' rights, slashed public services and tried to destroy the National Health Service, increased the gap between rich and poor and installed the basis for today's right wing political philosophy of "I, me, mine".

In my view, her policies destroyed Britain. I left in 1984, partially because Thatcher's England was no longer the England of my dreams."

I also got hammered that evening in celebration of the bitch's demise.

[Plantagenet]

I ... got hammered that evening in celebration of the bitch's demise.

Isn't that what you do every evening anyway?

You seem like the kind of thoughtful person who would think of something extra special to do to celebrate your joy at Ms. Thatcher's death and not just mindlessly do the same old thing again.

[Oneaboveall]

http://youtu.be/EwnkFlVRCZc

[Oneaboveall]

Ding Dong the witch is dead!

The song has a very good chance of topping the UK top 40 singles chart this week!

Supporters are trying to push this song as a counter:
The Notsensibles: I'm in Love With Margaret Thatcher

[dorlomin]

Justice for the 96. Investigate Orgreave.

[Quinny]

Supporters?? LMFAO!

Burnley lads taking the piss!

Ding Dong the witch is dead!

The song has a very good chance of topping the UK top 40 singles chart this week!

Supporters are trying to push this song as a counter:
The Notsensibles: I'm in Love With Margaret Thatcher

[Plantagenet]

There was a public party at Trafalgar Square in London to celebrate Ms. Thatcher's death, but it didn't get much of a turnout and those there quickly turned it into a drunken scrum. Nine folks were arrested ---all for public drunkenness.

The Brits are relieved---the idea of celebrating someone's death is pretty crude, even for folks who live in the EU. They're hoping the drunks got it out of their system and won't try to disrupt the decorum of the upcoming state funeral service for Ms. Thatcher.

[Beery1]

Supporters?? LMFAO!

Burnley lads taking the piss!

Yeah, but let's hope the Thatcherites don't catch on. We might get two songs making fun of the old cow at the top of the charts, LOL.

[AgentR11]

Celebrating the death of one's political adversaries is primitive and repulsive. Suitable for an era of petty warlords, not mature democracies.

[Oneaboveall]

Supporters?? LMFAO!

Burnley lads taking the piss!

Oi!

Yeah, I figured the song was sarcastic; unless it was done by Combat 84 or something, but you figure the irony would be lost on them.

[Plantagenet]

...the bitch's demise.

What exactly are you so angry about, Ian? I clicked on your link and read your personal blog on this and you said you are enraged because 30 years ago Ms. Thatcher didn't give you free milk.

Why should Ms. Thatcher have given you free milk? Is there some reason you (or your parents) were incapable of going to a store to buy your own milk? Are you handicapped or disabled or were you on the dole or something?

Whatever reason you had for not buying your own milk, I suggest you "man up" and get over it -- try to accept that there is nothing wrong with you buying your own milk with your own money just like other people do.


30 years ago Ms. Thatcher made Ian buy his own milk---gosh how terrible

[davep]

The Brits are relieved

The same Brits who propelled Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead to No 1 in the charts?

She was a hugely divisive figure and people have long memories of how she let whole communities die. Don't try to speak for Brits on a subject of which you know nothing.

[Arthur75]

Didn't look at the report (yet) but a nice "oil oriented" timeline of Thatcher years below :
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/9936#comment-956275

[Plantagenet]

A few Thatcher death party celebrations turned into riots in cities other than London. The young people lighting bonfires and getting drunk started looting and attacking police

Some Thatcher death party celebrations lead to riots and looting in England

I'm still puzzled as to why these young drunken rioters hate Thatcher so much. Judging from the pics of the rioters in the news story, it appears that they are almost all 20-somethings---people too young to have even been alive during the times when Thatcher was PM.

Maybe their parents hated Thatcher so much that they taught their children to hate Thatcher too? Or could it be that Thatcher's death is just an excuse for UK leftists and anti-establishment youth to get outside in the first blush of spring after a cold, wet winter and booze it up and party party party and then smash some windows and steal steal steal?