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Politesub53 -> RE: The French are rioting again! (5/1/2016 5:02:26 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: vincentML
Politics seems to be a simplistic excuse. Thatcher had increased interest rates, and a nasty recession took hold, in the middle of which Thatcher raised taxes. Three million to five million Brits were tossed onto the unemployment heap. Additionally, there were plans afoot to close many mines. Thatcher responded to the strikes with police occupation and violence at the mines. Rather sticky activity by her.
It’s that under the prime minister’s guidance, MI5, police Special Branch, GCHQ and the NSA were mobilised not only to spy on the NUM on an industrial scale, but to employ agents provocateurs at the highest level of the union, dirty tricks, slush funds, false allegations, forgeries, phoney cash deposits and multiple secretly sponsored legal actions to break the defence of the mining communities.
In the years since, Thatcher and her former ministers and intelligence mandarins have defended such covert action by insisting the NUM leaders were “subversive” because they wanted to bring down the government. Which of course they did – but “legitimately”, as Scargill remarked recently, by bringing about a general election – as took place in the wake of the successful coal strike of 1974.
I had to chuckle at the notion "politics seems a simple excuse" since you suggest Scargill wanted for force a political election. You cant have a trade union continually causing chaos to bring down an elected government, that simply isnt how democracy works. The Miners had to be stopped.
Some UK Police forces during the eighties left a lot to be desired, while other were very good. Your link to the Guardian Article is pretty accurate, and I say that as someone who voted for Thatcher in every election. Read the link for Oregreave if you havent already done so.
As for interest rates, they had been high before Thatcher and at one point she did manage to bring them right down. Incidentally, having lived through both, I hate the current zero interest rates and austerity budgets more than anything Thatcher done. Whatever else, the rich get richer while the poor get poorer. We have local elections as well as a few Mayoral Elections this week, be prepared for shocks and protest votes.
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