I'm not sure if the "Good riddance" there is aimed at Thatcher or tories who died in the IRA bombing. I'd consider myself firmly on the left but, if its the latter, then that is ridiculously low and you ought to be ashamed!
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,Where there is hatred, let me sow love;Where there is injury, pardon;Where there is doubt, faith;Where there is despair, hope;Where there is darkness, light;Where there is sadness, joy.O Divine Master,grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;to be understood, as to understand;to be loved, as to love.For it is in giving that we receive.It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.Amen.
Will, I don't know what age you are, but I suspect both you and I are too young to fully grasp how emotive and divisive these issues were at a certain time. I'm not saying its an admirable sentiment by any means. But imposing a judgment from the position of being someone who "wasn't there", is to my mind almost as bad as lionizing someone just because they happen to have died. Some lives are more worthy of grief than others, and many people won't grieve Thatcher one bit. At the same time, she didn't become PM by accident.
John, Linda, you're absolutely right - it is undoubtedly easier to stand on a moral high ground when you weren't personally affected by past events, but not impossible. I have no problem with people harbouring hatred and ill-feeling toward her, she certainly earned it; but it's the act of celebration I find fault with.Her death achieves nothing. Our manufacturing industries will not be rebuilt, the communities she flattened will not be restored, we are still in an economic recession brought about by the proliferation of the greed she encouraged. By raising a glass to her death you are merely saying "I outlived you", which isn't really a great feat when the opposition is a frail old woman who has been on death's door for a number of years.
She used troops as strike breakers
she certainly authorised police to act as troops. Or perhaps even worse than troops, to act with complete disregard for the law or any form of decency.