Margaret Thatcher

Former Obama Official Asks: 'Can Gay Marriage Defeat the Islamic State?'
By Tom Blumer | June 30, 2015 | 2:46 PM EDT

In a column at ForeignPolicy.com, a former Obama administration defense official who "served as a counselor to the U.S. defense undersecretary for policy from 2009 to 2011" has asked: "Can Gay Marriage Defeat the Islamic State?"

Rosa Brooks, who "is a law professor at Georgetown University," is serious. Her earnestness and deep ignorance are especially troubling, because it's clear that there are many people who "think" just like her who are still in the Obama administration and at the State Department (See: John Kerry's slow-motion sellout in Iranian negotiations).

New York Times Thrilled By 'The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher' Story
By Tim Graham | October 8, 2014 | 7:13 AM EDT

It’s easily guessed that no one at the New York Times would welcome a book titled “The Assassination of Barack Obama.” But the Times is in love with a book titled “The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher.”

This book of short stories by British author Hilary Mantel graced the cover of Sunday’s book review, but mysteriously, that review by Terry Castle didn’t discuss the short story on killing Thatcher while she was Britain's prime minister until the penultimate paragraph. That’s because I missed the Gray Lady’s other celebrations of Mantel’s Maggie-murder tale.

Do You Agree, Brian? Williams Says Shevardnadze 'Admitted That Too Much Democracy Was a Bad Thing'
By Tom Blumer | July 8, 2014 | 8:32 PM EDT

On Monday evening's NBC Nightly News, host Brian Williams used a perhaps revealing verb to describe a belief held by former Soviet foreign minister and Georgian president Eduard Shevardnadze, who died on Monday at 86.

It would be good to look back and learn how Shevardnadze came to say what he said a decade ago before getting to how Williams framed it. As reported in Doug Martin's obituary at the New York Times (bolds are mine throughout this post):

MSNBC Savaged Thatcher When She Died, But Now Matthews Insists It’s ‘Not Nice’ to Attack Dead Leaders
By Scott Whitlock | December 10, 2013 | 9:46 AM EST

An indignant Chris Matthews on Monday took internet attacks on the late Nelson Mandela, allegedly from conservative commenters, and slammed the right for a lack of respect towards the South African leader: “Don’t they know that it’s not nice to make fun of a person so recently deceased, much less the world’s most honored champion of human freedom?”

Yet, how did the journalists at MSNBC and NBC respond to the death of Margaret Thatcher, someone who championed freedom in the struggle against communism? On the day she died, Richard Wolffe, a regular on Matthews’s show and network, seethed, “She had an attitude to her domestic enemies that frankly was the antithesis of freedom.”  Another Matthews colleague, Brian Williams offered up an even more vicious attack.

Rest In Whitewash: Networks Set to Ignore Mandela's Communist Party Ties, Dictator Friends
By Tim Graham | December 7, 2013 | 7:07 PM EST

At the Daily Beast, Michael Moynihan attempted to overcome the tendency of journalists and celebrities to make Nelson Mandela a secular saint. Moynihan recalled that when Margaret Thatcher died, these same people denounced her for here "indulgence" of right-wing dictators like Agosto Pinochet in Chile, who allowed his country to become a democracy.

ABC called her reign an “elective dictatorship.” NBC reported several times that “Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead” became a popular iTune after she passed away, and CBS predicted the funeral would be a "tense and controversial affair." It's safe to guess these networks wouldn't dream of recalling Mandela’s associations with despots like Fidel Castro and Muammar Qaddafi, as Moynihan insisted they should:

NYT's Sanger Pathetically Compares Cameron's UK War Support Failure to Reagan-Thatcher Falklands Disagreement
By Tom Blumer | August 30, 2013 | 4:30 PM EDT

Well, if you can't say anything good about how your guy's foreign policy is going, you can at least try to trash one of his predecessors so your guy doesn't look so bad.

That would appear to be the idea behind David E. Sanger's attempt at the New York Times today to falsely inform readers that the two towering leaders of the 1980s, Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, angrily disagreed over the UK's choice to retake the Falkland Islands after Argentina had seized them. Sanger linked back to a previous Times story which clearly pointed to the real disagreement, but never described anything resembling anger. Additionally, a cable from Secretary of State Alexander Haig during that era directly refutes Sanger's contention.

Mick Jagger Tells DC Concert Crowd: 'I Don't Think Obama Is Here But I'm Sure He's Listening In'
By Noel Sheppard | June 24, 2013 | 10:52 PM EDT

Famed rock group the Rolling Stones played the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C., Monday, and according to numerous fans reporting on Twitter, lead singer Mick Jagger took a shot at the current White House resident and his recently revealed domestic surveillance program.

Self-described progressive @MikeCarvalho tweeted during the show, "I don't think President Obama is here, but I'm sure he's listening in.' - Mick Jagger":

NY Times Doesn't Let 'Costly' Funeral Halt Criticism of 'Deeply Polarizing...Divisive' Thatcher
By Clay Waters | April 17, 2013 | 2:19 PM EDT

The New York Times marked the day of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher's funeral with disrespect, with London bureau chief John Burns reporting from one of the last places on earth likely to offer sympathetic tribute to the prime minister who broke the left-wing coal miners' union: A mining town in the middle of England.

And the paper's post-funeral story today offered left-wing "complaints about its cost and appropriateness" of the funeral sandwiched around accounts of ghoulish lefty celebrations of Thatcher's passing.

As Britain Says Goodbye, Networks Tout Ugly Attacks on 'Polarizing,' 'Divisive' Margaret Thatcher
By Scott Whitlock | April 17, 2013 | 12:24 PM EDT

In the days leading up to Margaret Thatcher's funeral on Wednesday, the three networks repeatedly hyped hateful, ugly attacks on the former Prime Minister of Britain, describing her as a "polarizing," "divisive" figure. On Rock Center, his low-rated Friday night show, Brian Williams explained that it was "sad, but necessary to report" that, while Americans may like Thatcher, "It's been a harsh couple of days ...Tonight, the number one song on iTunes in Great Britain is the Wizard of Oz classic [Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead], in this case celebrating the death of the Iron Lady." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

On Sunday's Today, Lester Holt began by insisting, "Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is proving to be as polarizing in death as she was in life." He, too, highlighted angry liberals in Britain gleefully playing the mocking song. Leftist journalist Martin Bashir appeared on the program to bemoan the "controversial" Thatcher. He touted, "An online campaign has pushed the song Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead up towards the top of the British music charts."

Daily Kos Week in Review: Grave Dancers' Union
By Tom Johnson | April 12, 2013 | 10:22 PM EDT

This past week, while some Kossacks bade Margaret Thatcher a not-so-fond farewell, others argued that the Democratic party has moved so far to the right that it would suit, say, Ronald Reagan, and even Thatcher if she'd been an American.
 
As usual, each headline is preceded by the blogger's name or pseudonym.

Cal Thomas Column: The Lady Was a Champ
By Cal Thomas | April 12, 2013 | 6:41 PM EDT

MANCHESTER, England -- There is a story about Margaret Thatcher, which is probably apocryphal, but speaks volumes about the strength of Britain's first female prime minister, who died Monday at age 87.

Following her election in 1979, the story goes that Thatcher took her all-male cabinet out to dinner. The waiter asked what she would like. "I'll have the beef," she said. The waiter asked, "What about the vegetables?" "They'll have the same," Thatcher replied.

WaPo's London Bureau Chief: Thatcher's Death 'Appears To Be Opening Old Wounds'
By Matt Vespa | April 12, 2013 | 8:00 AM EDT

As the world mourns the loss of one of the greatest stateswomen of the 20th century, Washington Post London bureau chief Anthony Faiola wrote yesterday that Margaret Thatcher’s death “appears to be opening old wounds.” To do so, however, Faiola selectively picked up anecdotes of left-wing hate-mongering, such as how the UK's leading conservative paper Faiola noted how the UK's Tory-leaning Telegraph newspaper had to close down the comments section about Lady Thatcher’s death due to the depraved vitriol of the nation’s left wing Internet trolls.

Faiola's prime example of how Lady Thatcher's death was dividing Great Britain was the occasional outbreak of leftists punks dancing in the streets in celebration of the former prime minister's death. Included in the story was a photograph from St. George's Square in Glasgow, where it seems only about 15-20 people showed up to figuratively dance on the Iron Lady's grave.