I believe many Brits are ungrateful with Maggie, probably the best PM post WWII.

It can be - and is strongly believed - that the economic policies of Thatcher and Reagan set the stage for the economic mess we all find ourselves in.

Living here, I have encountered very few Brits looking back at Thatcher with rose-tinted glasses.

Nobody will ever hear me say, "Ronnie, I miss you." More than anything... I was happiest during the Clinton years, even though I was poor and barely making ends meet during those 8 years.

The Thatcher years were not all roses. Britain in the 80s was in constant political change, moving away from trade unionism and a strike mentality to a working nation trying to wrangle some credibility in Europe.

I'm not a believer in blaming or applauding politicians for economic circumstances, small businesses and attitudes get things done. Assessing Thatcher after all these years because of her Euro-skepticism is, from my point of view, trying to match facts back to history because the circumstances look similar. They aren't. Thatcher was just the spokeswoman in a fairly right wing conservative period when Britain's populace had had enough of strikes and trade unions after a long decade of failed Labour Party quasi-socialism with Wilson and Callaghan.

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Crash your karma into little bits of happiness

Rose-tainted implies distortion. You don't need to look at the past with rose-anything. You just need a critical, informed view of it.

I suppose some people just don't know what is best for them long-term. Short-term is quite easy. The tricky bit is the long-view. That's the view that needs more courage and more next-generation care.

But I suppose that that is what democracy is about: You also have the right to shoot your foot today and get (& provide to the younger) the bullet 10-20 years down the line.

Margaret Thatcher was one of the best, if not the best, PM GB ever had. If only she were around to govern today!

I notice you have received some high fives, but its all far from evidence based fact. It is not strongly believed, but it is a very tiny minute 'half truth'.

Firstly, politicians are politicians, they make promises and then use money other than their own to pay for them - spending is easy, and its the only thing that politicians around the world can agree on. Basically, ALL CAREER politicians are like this, left, right or centre. The only difference being that some are more extreme than others, and some may appear to be more genuine than others.

To say that they 'set the stage' is a load of complete nonsense. I could equally give you evidence that Greenspan may have been even more quilty of the crisis purely because of his constant and perceived market interference, known as the 'Greenspan put'. Either way you can hardly pin the blame of the crisis on a couple or group of individuals because its a system wide problem - and its mostly to do with favouritism of the finance sector, building unsustainable welfare states and then using democracy (or hijacking it) to implement it legally - again thats totally bipartisan. If you want evidence, just look up rises in debt during a particular presidency - they all are pretty much up in direction. And yes, Reagans (Rep) is high, Clintons (Dem) was also, just like Bushs (Rep) which is staggering and which Obama will top (Dem).

In our modern society, when politicians make promises these promises are paid for two ways - either through taxes or debt. A long time ago it used to be more through taxes, but today it is more through debt. Now debt is worse for us modern day plebs because no-one sees it until it becomes a problem. The other awesome thing (from a politicians POV) with debt is that once it becomes a problem the politician in question is probably long retired and out of office anyway. Therefore the next elected politician can simply blame the one previously for taking on more debt than the last- and so on (Obama here is doing an A grade job). Because the voting public doesnt give a damn about debt, more promises paid through debt can be fulfilled. The politicians have happily jumped on the bandwagon because they can only see as far as the next election - they're pro-finance and central bank stand paid off handsomely.

If you want to know where the explosion in promises paid by debt started in the US then we should probably start with Nixon (a republican), but its irrelevant, someone else would have taken his place and done the same. On the other side, England had economic problems in the 1970's that required IMF assistance anyway. Thatcher came to power in 1979. 1964 to 1979 was labour in government except for 1970-1974 (hope I checked correctly). So what does it say? Well nothing apart from proving my point above about bipartisanship. But you can hardly pin the blame on one person.

The reason she isnt loved is because she didnt just dislike socialists she hated them, and not just privately, she showed this publicly. To 'hate' is a very big deal to many, it creates enemies, it stirs emotions insinuating hard core. So it is hardly surprising that for most academics, teachers, artists, politicians, journalists (the core group of people that engage with society as a whole) she was not seen in a positive light. I wouldnt be interested in how many brits like her or not, im interested in what percentage of Labour and then Conservative supporters like or dislike her. But then again, it wouldnt prove much.