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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"I'm not a hypocrite. I spoke ill of her when she was alive & I'll speak ill of her now she's dead."
"I'll tell you what really annoyed us miners," said Pete Mansell, sipping a pint of John Smith's on Monday. "She said we were the enemy within. We weren't. We were just looking after our lives, our families, our kids and our properties, everything that we ever had. We were fighting for that big style."
Along with most of the other men drinking in the Black Bull pub in Aughton, Rotherham, the 55-year-old former pit worker had borne witness to the fiercest confrontation in the miners strike at the nearby Orgreave coking plant on 18 June 1984.
Almost 30 years have gone by since Margaret Thatcher characterised those who took part in the "battle of Orgreave" as thugs. But in a village that one drinker said had been "decimated by Thatcher", the words still cut deep. It is perhaps no surprise that those gathered in the pub were having what they described as a party after hearing about her death.
<snip>
There were 95 miners arrested at Orgreave and prosecuted for riot, a charge that carried the potential for a long prison sentence up to a maximum of life. But a year later, on 17 July 1985, all 95 were acquitted. The prosecution withdrew, from the first trial of 15, after police gave unconvincing accounts in the witness box: it became clear that the miners had themselves been attacked by police on horses or with truncheons, and there was evidence that a police officer's signature on a statement had been forged.
I strongly encourage DUers to go to the link and read the whole piece - especially those who are too young to remember what was going on in those days when Thatcher was in power.
Bonus pic - here's Steve Bell's (Brit cartoonist) eulogy for Thatcher:
All I will say is, I hope she has gone on to the reward she so richly deserves.
sw
forestpath
(3,102 posts)I remember wishing that Americans were half as informed about what was going on here as the English were about their country.
scarletwoman
(31,893 posts)I totally sympathized with the fury of the working class, as Thatcher was stomping them down.
dflprincess
(28,057 posts)I heard about this website several months ago. In the past in just said "No". There's a little more there today.
http://www.isthatcherdeadyet.co.uk/
I suppose it could be argued that it is in poor taste, but I'm with Scarlet Woman, I'm not going to start saying nice things about her now that she's gone and I'm not going to pretend I'm shocked that people in her own country aren't crying crocodile tears like so many in the U.S. did when her buddy Reagan died.
forestpath
(3,102 posts)dflprincess
(28,057 posts)there is some stuff there that made me laugh out loud. Anyone walking down the hall past my apartment who heard may have thought I finally went over the edge.
gussmith
(280 posts)Tonight Rachel Maddow politely burned Thatcher. The next show, Lawrence O'Donnell made some fine comparisons with today's political parties in America and showed clips of Thatcher's speeches. She was a bleeding liberal compared to today's Republican party members. Good to see more than a few incidents cast in stone as one's legacy. Thanks, Lawrence.
malaise
(267,784 posts)dflprincess
(28,057 posts)http://www.isthatcherdeadyet.co.uk/
[div class = "excerpt"]
Margaret Thatcher's death greeted with street parties in Brixton and Glasgow
Several hundred people gathered in south London on Monday evening to celebrate Margaret Thatcher's death with cans of beer, pints of milk and an impromptu street disco playing the soundtrack to her years in power.
Young and old descended on Brixton, a suburb which weathered two outbreaks of rioting during the Thatcher years. Many expressed jubilation that the leader they loved to hate was no more; others spoke of frustration that her legacy lived on.
To cheers of "Maggie Maggie Maggie, dead dead dead," posters of Thatcher were held aloft as reggae basslines pounded.
Clive Barger, a 62-year-old adult education tutor, said he had turned out to mark the passing of "one of the vilest abominations of social and economic history".
He said: "It is a moment to remember. She embodied everything that was so elitist in terms of repressing people who had nothing. She presided over a class war."
Can you imagine the American media covering any reactions like this to Reagan's death?
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)I plan to glue pellets to my face for that party.
Rozlee
(2,529 posts)I signed to go into the Army to safeguard my country from all enemies foreign and domestic and those assholes had me safeguarding oil for Exxon. I'm on 100% service connection now and when each of those bastards kicks the bucket, I'm opening a bottle of bubbly and boogie dancing 'til I do a face smash on the carpet.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)UTUSN
(70,494 posts)I'll be saying the same thing.
The old joke: A man paid for newspaper at the corner every morning, looked at the headline, and dumped it whole. Every morning. The seller finally asked him why. He said he was looking for an obituary. The seller said obituaries are in an inner section. The man said, "When the (expletive) I'm looking for dies, it will be above the fold!1"
Since the joke sounds dated with corner newstands and such, I regretfully suspect it was about FDR, but it can be stretched to whomever.