In reviewing The Iron Lady I made the offhand comment that Margaret Thatcher had been the Greatest Woman of the Twentieth Century. The debate over the greatest man had taken place at the end of 1999 and the choices, at least in the English speaking world, were narrowed down to Sir Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Although there was some debate over which may have been the greater of the two, there did seem to be a distance between them and whoever might have been third.
Oddly, however, there was no one chosen as the Greatest Woman, and I suspect it is because there was no one who stood out to the same extent as Margaret Thatcher. She was clearly so far ahead of the rest that even to raise the question shows how much she stood out from all other possible choices. Whether you loved her, hated her or were merely indifferent, she along with Ronald Reagan, dominated the events of her time. But because she is a woman of the right, a classical liberal in the conservative tradition, those who typically hand out such laurels refused to raise the subject so that they could avoid even having to acknowledge how significant her role had been.
Margaret Thatcher inherited a Britain devastated by industrial mayhem following the Winter of Discontent and within half a decade returned sound governance to the UK. She endured the full impact of the miners’s strikes and restored industrial relations sanity by sheer force of will. She took on and prevailed against Argentina in the War in the Falklands. She strode like a colossus during the Cold War which she, along with Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II, were instrumental in bringing to a peaceful end through an unbending moral crusade against political evil. She demanded fiscal and monetary disciplines that ended the economic chaos of the 1970s. She drove privatisation and defended our entrepreneurially-driven system of free enterprise. She was a model for others to follow as many have done. She remains to this day the gold standard of a conviction politician on the right side of history. If being a force for good is what matters, Margaret Thatcher was undoubtedly the greatest woman of the twentieth century.
That is why Gillard’s minders want to compare her to The Iron Lady. Sigh.
Thumbnail
20 Jan 12 at 8:36 am
Abbott the Iron Man vs Gillard the “self proclaimed” Iron Lady.
Peter
20 Jan 12 at 8:42 am
Gillard’s theft o the title Iron Lady is an insult to Thatcher.
Michael
20 Jan 12 at 8:43 am
The way things are heading, if not already arrived at, we are needing several people of greatness to inject a large dose of reality.
Biota
20 Jan 12 at 8:44 am
So, Gillard to call herself Iron Lady, what a joke.
Scurry off the chamber to avoid scrutiny.
Backroom deals to bribe suppport at taxpayers expense.
Ram through legislations without debate.
Disappear to skip all hard questions
No way is that Iron Lady
Sally
20 Jan 12 at 8:49 am
Gillard isn’t even an ironing lady…
ar
20 Jan 12 at 8:54 am
No offence meant to any actual ironing ladies who may be reading this blog…
ar
20 Jan 12 at 8:55 am
I’d have Gandhi over the other two blokes, myself.
No arguments over Thatcher, though.
m0nty
20 Jan 12 at 8:56 am
Honorable mention would have to go to Elizabeth II, who has reigned with great care and diplomacy for half the century. Soft power par excellence.
She is another reason why progressives might accidentally forget to award a lady of the century prize.
Bruce
20 Jan 12 at 9:05 am
Bruce,
List her achievements wrt to the exposition of “soft power”.
.
20 Jan 12 at 9:07 am
Monty,
Gandhi? No doubt a great man and great Indian but man of the century?
John Comnenus
20 Jan 12 at 9:10 am
Gandhi?
For chrissakes, his tactics only worked because he was up against the British. Let him try that nonviolence bullshit against the Germans.
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 9:18 am
I think they’re right, though. Maggie and the lying slapper are very similar and both born to do great things.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 9:22 am
Not Guevara?
ar
20 Jan 12 at 9:23 am
Gillard Iron Lady?
Rusty.
kae
20 Jan 12 at 9:27 am
Allow me to nominate my mum.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 9:34 am
You’re a soft touch, IT. You still nominate her even after she threw you out of the house to live in a swag for six months.
steve from brisbane
20 Jan 12 at 9:36 am
I think the best thing a parent can do is throw kids out of the house the moment they turn 18.
Government should do the same.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 9:41 am
Gandhi deserved at least an honourable mention, (so did Einstein). Churchill might deserve the title, but his not-so-nonviolent tactics only worked because he had a pretty good anti tank ditch.
Bill
20 Jan 12 at 9:44 am
Along with the gate-crashers…
ar
20 Jan 12 at 9:44 am
Marie Curie did a lot of her work in the 20th century.
steve from brisbane
20 Jan 12 at 9:44 am
What about Dr Catherine Hamiln who set up the Fistula Hospital?
People can be great in many ways. This lady has saved many thousands of women from a sinply awful existence.
Helen Armstrong
20 Jan 12 at 9:53 am
Churchill had the wartime resolve of the British to rely upon, a tradition that spans hundreds of years of rearguard action. Gandhi had a disparate set of secular groupings and no history of being a sovereign nation in recent times, and he managed to become the talisman that brought hundreds of millions of people together into one society not through politics or diplomacy as we normally understand it, but a new kind of gesture in the form of non-violent protest. The 20th century had so many wars, but I think the greatest achievement was Gandhi’s in that he was somehow able to become the father of one of the most populous countries of the world by specifically going against the grain of military conflict. It was the most audacious campaign of the century, in many ways.
m0nty
20 Jan 12 at 9:56 am
Among the blokes, any mention of Norman Borlaug? From Wikipedia:
“During the mid-20th century, Borlaug led the introduction of these high-yielding varieties combined with modern agricultural production techniques to Mexico, Pakistan, and India. As a result, Mexico became a net exporter of wheat by 1963. Between 1965 and 1970, wheat yields nearly doubled in Pakistan and India, greatly improving the food security in those nations.[4] These collective increases in yield have been labeled the Green Revolution, and Borlaug is often credited with saving over a billion people worldwide from starvation.[5] He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 in recognition of his contributions to world peace through increasing food supply.”
Capitalist Piggy
20 Jan 12 at 10:08 am
As long as FDR is on the list of candidates for greatness we are in deep shit.
Hey, the spectacle of the New Deal – burning crops, throwing away food – drove starving Continental intellectuals like Koestler screaming into the arms of the communists. They believed the bullshit that the New Deal was invented to save capitalism!
Rafe
20 Jan 12 at 10:14 am
Borlaug, yay, lets hear it for the Ag Scientists again!!
Rafe
20 Jan 12 at 10:15 am
Gandhi was not a nation. You’re right about that.
ar
20 Jan 12 at 10:22 am
Yes, that would be a great achievement.
ar
20 Jan 12 at 10:23 am
Sophie Scholl
Marie Curie
Golda Meir
Cheryl Kernot
IT’s mum
All greater women than Thatcher.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 10:24 am
Monica bellucci should have to be on that list les
Jc
20 Jan 12 at 10:35 am
Of course, as far as Kates is concerned, Golda Meir (as a socialist) was basically a totalitarian and a nazi.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 10:38 am
Dot, when I was a kid we drove 30 miles and lined up 5 deep along a road in northern NSW just to see the Queen briefly as she went past. Same thing still happens nowadays, even in the jaded 21st Century.
I think she’s had a considerable influence on keeping the Commonwealth as a going concern – so much so that even Mozambique and Rwanda have joined. A talking shop, yes, but talk lubricates peaceful trade & diplomacy. I very much doubt the Commonwealth would have survived as an institution with a Julia Gillard on the UK throne.
A contrast with someone like Mary mother of James I, who created chaos even in Scotland when she was more or less constitutional monarch. There the UK might have been if a Stuart was head of state in the 20thC.
And no I’m not a monarchist…I’d prefer the Irish model.
Bruce
20 Jan 12 at 10:41 am
Leaving your love to kick Steve aside Les, Golda Meir (for all her stature and achievements) did not change the world the way Thatcher did.
Why Kernot Les? Was it her work as a women’s cricket umpire?
Token
20 Jan 12 at 10:42 am
m0nty I think you overestimate the wartime resolve of Britain immediately after the shock of the fall of France. Many influential people in Britain wanted to sue for peace as the logical solution. It was Churchill who prevailed after a crucial few days.
Recommended: Five days in London.
derp
20 Jan 12 at 10:45 am
Damn, there is the link: Five Days in London
derp
20 Jan 12 at 10:46 am
Cheryl provided comfort and succor to the greatest foreign minister of the twentieth century, Gareth Evans.
Plus her contribution to women’s cricket.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 10:51 am
Is ‘succor’ a euphemism, Tillman?
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 10:53 am
Who is this “Tillman” of which you speak?
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 10:55 am
And who could forget Lady Di and how she opened herself up to the Muslim world.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 10:59 am
what about this lady, Tillers?
http://www.smh.com.au/world/exwife-says-gingrich-wanted-open-marriage-20120120-1q8yw.html
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 11:02 am
“Who is this “Tillman” of which you speak?”
Only the greatest woman of the 20th century, duh!
Gab
20 Jan 12 at 11:03 am
An otherwise charming fellow stricken down with Obamamania
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 11:04 am
She also opened herself up to England rugby captains too, Les.
tbh
20 Jan 12 at 11:06 am
Apparently Newt is a maniac for BJs. Even more so than Clinton.
Wonder how Callista reconciles that with catholic prohibitions on spilling one’s seed.
Perhaps we’ll find out when she is FLOTUS.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:06 am
What about Mrs Churchill?
Not overlooking the original Mrs Smith – start breeder of all the smith tribe.
jjohn malpas
20 Jan 12 at 11:11 am
Gandhi. Gandhi wanted the Jews to submit to Hitler and allow him to massacre them without resistance. As jtfsoon says, Gandhi was just lucky it was the British that was his adversary, and not the Nazis or the Japanese. Quoting Orwell: “It is difficult to see how Gandhi’s methods could be applied in a country where opponents of the regime disappear in the middle of the night and are never heard of again.”
Andreas
20 Jan 12 at 11:11 am
GAndhi was the most influential urine drinker of the 20th century. Sex maniac too.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 11:13 am
I’m with Capitalist Piggy – on sheer scale of good works, Borlaug easily beats mere politicians, especially FDR and Churchill.
As for greatest woman, how can we go past Marie Curie? Discoverer of elements, theoretician and practitioner who had a tremendous impact on scientific thought, first female Nobel laureate, first person to get TWO Nobel prizes, the only person to get them in two separate fields, and she even donated the gold medals to the war effort!
Jarrah
20 Jan 12 at 11:14 am
You simply cannot go to temple until the next day after you have washed. It’s in the good book.
.
20 Jan 12 at 11:18 am
No Ayn Rand?
As much as I adore Maggie, nominating politicians are the “greatest” of whatever epoch merely perpetuates the myth that we can’t live without taxeaters.
So my nomination for greatest woman of the twentieth century would in fact be the collection of women throughout the world who took up the liberalising opportunities laid out before them by their nineteenth century forebears by assuming education, work and, most importantly, establishing their own business.
Julie Novak
20 Jan 12 at 11:18 am
Not their worst traits by far.
Jc
20 Jan 12 at 11:24 am
Seeing Gingrich has already got a mention in the thread, I’ll mention as an aside that Herman Cain’s much anticipated (by me at least) “unconventional” endorsement turned out to be “the people”.
I suppose seeing how he propositions half of them, it makes sense.
steve from brisbane
20 Jan 12 at 11:24 am
I dislike the term ‘greatest’, certainly in this context. The way I see it, Thatcher was there to do a job and she did it reasonably well. She should be commended for her service, and applauded for her successes, but not worshipped… ‘greatness’ sounds more like the term you’d be expected apply to an emperor or king, 1000 odd years ago.
TimT
20 Jan 12 at 11:26 am
As for Roosevelt vs Churchill… I read about some of Roosevelt’s taxation policies last night. Over 100 per cent on some incomes! Ridiculous.
TimT
20 Jan 12 at 11:30 am
She was the de facto emperor of Britain.
Remember the line “what about the vegetables?”
“they will have steak as well”.
Rafe
20 Jan 12 at 11:31 am
What TimT said, thank FDR for the US debt. And entitlements. And thank Eleanor as well if you want o bring a “great” woman into it.
Rafe
20 Jan 12 at 11:33 am
This thread is sexist and should be shut down, sayeth the greatest woman of this century.
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 11:33 am
TimT, as I read history I always thought that anyone called the greatest was not that impressive.
The Bulgar-slayer, The Slit-nosed, The Dung-named, The Drunkard,
They are impressive titles
Token
20 Jan 12 at 11:35 am
OK I’ll give up Catherine Hamlin for Borlaug.
Helen Armstrong
20 Jan 12 at 11:38 am
Great point CL and it really leads to another . You can’t be great as a woman unless you’re on Emily’s List.
Jc
20 Jan 12 at 11:39 am
you’re truly evil, CL,
Gab
20 Jan 12 at 11:40 am
What!! How could any other 20th century woman be more important, influential, insightful, far-thinking, and possessed of the Real Truth about humanity and society, than Ayn Rand. It goes against the very phlosophy of this site, even to suggest such a thing. Shame on you, Kates, shame I say.
ACTOldFart
20 Jan 12 at 11:54 am
Gandhi??
FMD you must be joking.
That useless sack of shyte played a leading role in stuffing up the Cripps Mission in 1943 and his shilly-shallying on the Pakistan issue guaranteed the War of Partition and thousands of dead.
His myth is the creation of propagandists, sustained by the most rancid and bong-addled of western hippies.
In any other polity than the British Empire he would have been arrested one midnight and quietly left dead at the bottom of a convenient lake.
Was he a great man? Yes. So were Hitler, Stalin and Mao, so were Macarthur, Auchinleck, von Runsdedt, Somerville, Jellicoe, French, Haig and thousands of others. he’s on that level.
Nowhere near Thatcher’s level at all.
Mk50 of Brisbane
20 Jan 12 at 12:30 pm
Hey,
ACT Old Fart, if you live in the ACT you are welcome to join our cat group that meets periodically over a beer or two. If you are interested let me know.
John Comnenus
20 Jan 12 at 12:43 pm
I think it was Churchill who said that it cost a lot of money to keep Gandhi in ‘poverty.’
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 12:50 pm
Don’t give up on Catherine Hamlin so easily Helen. I had the great pleasure of meeting her once. An extraordinary person. She has poise, grace, humility and modesty. Born to a life of relative privilege, she gave that away for a life of service living in a dangerous part of the world. A reminder that “greatness” comes in many forms.
1080
20 Jan 12 at 1:00 pm
It was Dolly Parton who said “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap”.
Dolly may be the greatest sheila of the 20th century.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 1:58 pm
monty
Why? His legacy has been to turn India into a shit fight between aristocratic Hindu Brahmin reactionaries vs. aristocratic Hindu Brahmin Maoists
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 1:59 pm
In reviewing The Iron Lady I made the offhand comment that Margaret Thatcher had been the Greatest Woman of the Twentieth Century. The debate over the greatest man had taken place at the end of 1999 and the choices, at least in the English speaking world, were narrowed down to Sir Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
Greatest at what? And when? Doubtless Winston Churchill was great in the war. So was Stalin. So they still say.
But that bulldog-faced rumpot would also have to be on a list of the 20th century’s greatest fuck-ups. I believe there’s a not so tidy ten-figure sum on a bill paid by American citizens over some ongoing rumpus in a one of ‘em. Not to mention the large five figure sum in lives. Not counting Iraqis o’ course.
Why should we still assume the ‘greatest’ to be war leaders? I’d put Kubrick way above both of these guys in the History Status Game. And Steve Jobs as well.
I will pay the status for Maggie Thatcher.
Adrien
20 Jan 12 at 2:04 pm
Because if the Nazis had overrun Western civilisation there might well be none of this wanky Apple stuff.
Still it does mean that General Eisenhower should also be credited.
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 2:07 pm
Leaving your love to kick Steve aside Les, Golda Meir (for all her stature and achievements) did not change the world the way Thatcher did.
Did Thatcher change the world? She changed Britain. And the manner in which she changed ain’t entirely in keeping with the principles of JS Mill. Sometimes quite the opposite.
Globally, she did prove the feminist point. She was a globally significant leader who disproved every objection traditionalists might have had to a woman leading the State. All in the space of a decade.
Adrien
20 Jan 12 at 2:07 pm
Because if the Nazis had overrun Western civilisation there might well be none of this wanky Apple stuff.
Dude the war ain’t one by the guy in the chair. It’s one on the field.
Adrien
20 Jan 12 at 2:08 pm
Thank FDR for Fannie Mae (and Nixon for Freddi Mac).
Capitalist Piggy
20 Jan 12 at 2:08 pm
That’s ‘won’
Adrien
20 Jan 12 at 2:08 pm
The Iraq War was as cheap as chips (Obama flushed more down the toilet in his first year in office), removed the late twentieth century’s worst mass murderer, became the arena for the large-scale extermination of Islamic terrorists and – we won.
It was a triumph.
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 2:10 pm
Steve Jobs? Gimme a break. WHat about Howard Florey or the guy who invented the bikini?
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 2:10 pm
Greatest woman? You can’t go past Mae West.
She led the way for gender equality:
She was an adventurer:
A celebrated economist and free-market thinker:
A level-headed humanitarian:
And a sage:
You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.
Gab
20 Jan 12 at 2:13 pm
J Edgar Hoover thought he was the most important woman of the 20th century.
steve from brisbane
20 Jan 12 at 2:13 pm
Tim Berners-Lee (who actually helped invent the Internet) would deserve it more than Jobs.
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 2:13 pm
what is it with Apple cultists?
Not all of us jizz at the sight of an aesthetically pleasing laptop
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 2:15 pm
It’s too subjective a thing to debate efficaciously.
Look, FDR was the greatest wheelchair-bound man of the twentieth century – just pipping Davros at the post.
Ike was great but the brains behind the Allies’ triumph he certainly wasn’t. Pound for pound, General Marshall was more important.
Australia produced no Great Leaders in the twentieth century. Curtin is touted by deluded ALP tragics but he was regarded as a panicking dingbat by the Americans.
No other female in the political realm troubles Thatcher for the title. But again, what is ‘greatness’? Cory Aquino and Aung San Su Chi risked more for their countries than Thatcher.
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 2:18 pm
Who brought up Ghandi?
Let me guess without looking, I swear. It had to be Monster.
I’m not going up thread to take a look so someone will have to declare if I’m right.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 2:20 pm
Bradman, Benaud, Border… Gorton.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 2:20 pm
Deng Xiaoping was pretty cool too, just quietly.
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 2:20 pm
I’m not kidding. One person I know actually sent a letter of condolence to the new CEO and this dude is not a homeridiot, at least I thought before he told me what he’d done.
I told him I felt embarrassed for him and left it at that.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 2:22 pm
Quite a feat for somebody who was celibate!
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 2:23 pm
Gandhi’s “celibacy” was a cunning ruse so he get his freak on with assorted hot tottie.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 2:28 pm
What about Madame Mao and her Australian offspring, Nanny Roxon?
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 2:36 pm
including his neice. No, sorry, that was a test of celibacy.
Helen Armstrong
20 Jan 12 at 2:42 pm
Gandhi’s civil rights crusade was a hoax. He didn’t care about equality, just about being lumped in the same coach as the Keffirs!
Fisky
20 Jan 12 at 3:26 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohandas_Karamchand_Gandhi
Gandhi to the Brits:
Gandhi to the Jews:
Gandhi on the blacks:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Smuts
jtfsoon
20 Jan 12 at 3:34 pm
Someone should’ve punched Gandhi right in the nose.
Infidel Tiger
20 Jan 12 at 3:35 pm
Liberty quote:
“There is no such thing as society: there are individual men and women, and there are families.” — Margaret Thatcher
Says it all really.
Next on the list: Mae West, courtesy of Gab.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
20 Jan 12 at 3:37 pm
He was the archetypal Indian. They’re incredibly up-themselves vis-a-vis blacks.
Even though they themselves ARE BLACK.
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 3:49 pm
I don’t recall any mufflers on the tanks in June 89..
Lazlo
20 Jan 12 at 4:25 pm
The Iraq War was as cheap as chips (Obama flushed more down the toilet in his first year in office),
I pity the fool. He thinks Iraq was cheap because Obama spent even more.
Adrien
20 Jan 12 at 5:18 pm
what is it with Apple cultists? Not all of us jizz at the sight of an aesthetically pleasing laptop
He invented personal computing.
I’ve gone off Apple. They opted to ramp up the style and drop the substance.
Adrien
20 Jan 12 at 5:20 pm
The most influential woman of the 20th C is f*&king Oprah. Her influence far exceeds Thatcher or anyone else. Not a good thing. Only in the USA … .
John H.
20 Jan 12 at 5:54 pm
John, Madonna would be up there too.
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 6:09 pm
Really John H.?
So Thatcher restored a nation’s economic and military pride and empowered many thousands from the lower end of the socio-economic spectrum to own their own home whilst Oprah funds a school in south Africa whilst stimulating the Australian Prime Minister -
“think of lard” aka the lying slapper to fly from Canberra to Melbourne as a PR exercise which ended up only in shaming the Australian nation?
JamesK
20 Jan 12 at 6:13 pm
James,
I’m not referring to the good they do, but their influence. I hate what Oprah has done, despise the bitch, but she is arguably the most influential woman of the 20th c.
John H.
20 Jan 12 at 6:14 pm
.
Indians are without peer as the most racist people on the planet. That’s why they get so paranoid when they come to the first world, coz nobody acknowledges the presumed superiority they lord over their racial inferiors at home.
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 6:15 pm
Indians are without peer as the most racist people on the planet.
The Japanese?
John H.
20 Jan 12 at 6:21 pm
Is there much internal racial hierarchy among the Japanese?
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 6:30 pm
Is there much internal racial hierarchy among the Japanese?
Don’t know Peter except that there is a despised ethnic group. I wish the West would stop the hand wringing over racism, we’re actually way ahead of the pack on conquering that one. My sister recently returned from China and stated that she felt the Chinese were very racist towards her and hubbie. As anyone else heard similiar stories?
John H.
20 Jan 12 at 6:33 pm
Oprah is and was a power for good – albeit occasionally misguided.
Contrast that with our lying slapper.
Thatcher was an extraordinary stateswoman who influenced many communist east european countries to see the light whilst giving hope and encouragement to their underground leaders and was a powerful ally of Poland’s Solidarity and Lech Walesa.
It’s just facile to equate Oprah and Thatcher.
JamesK
20 Jan 12 at 6:37 pm
Oprah is and was a power for good – albeit occasionally misguided.
What, she who promoted so many dodgy diets, or promoted so much alternative medicine bullshit, or made Deepak Chopra a celebrity, or waxed lyrical metaphysical bullshit with Gary fuck me I’m stupid Zukav?
I did not equate Oprah and Thatcher, in fact I think the very idea of determining the greatest is dumb because there is no valid metric. We can’t compare Teresa to Thatcher or Oprah. We can compare in like activities but not when their roles were so disparate. That is why I specifically referred to influence not achievement or “greatest”.
John H.
20 Jan 12 at 6:42 pm
From yesterday’s report on the constitional recognition of Aboriginals.
“Deakin explained the exclusion of Japanese people as follows:
In relation to the ‘aboriginal race’, Deakin declared:
In 1919, Prime Minister William Morris Hughes hailed the White Australia policy as ‘the greatest thing we have achieved’. During the Second World War, Prime Minister John Curtin reinforced the policy, saying: ‘This country shall remain forever the home of the descendants of those people who came here in peace in order to establish in the South Seas an outpost of the British race’.”
The left will make us wear these statements like a crown of thorns for all time.
New Gold Dream
20 Jan 12 at 6:42 pm
Why? The White Australia Policy was a victory of trade-unionists who wanted to maintain their “paradise for labour” over bourgeois desire to lower labour costs by importing Chinese, Indians, and Islanders. In other words, it was THE founding idea of the ALP.
I don’t know why people break out in rashes over these documents from history. The past is another country, they do things differently there, and all that.
Don’t try getting a degree in History, if Deakin’s remarks gives you hives. You ain’t seen nothing yet!
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 7:32 pm
No, I think it was cheap because it was cheap.
The cost associated with it and its effect on the deficit were invented codswallop.
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 8:47 pm
Exactly.
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 8:49 pm
Only a majority of them.
Brahmins of course, aren’t. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be Brahmins.
The reaction of sunlight and melanin has caused a lot of ‘misunderstanding’ amongst yumans, it seems.
P.S. Black?
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 8:58 pm
Not specifically the Brahmins, but the northern ‘Aryans’ more broadly identified the southern ‘Dravidians’ as filth. Indeed, it was the Hindus who invented racism.
Peter Patton
20 Jan 12 at 9:01 pm
Indeed, it was the Hindus who invented racism.
My understanding from reading a very long time ago was that Hinduism was invented by invading tribes as means of keeping the lower castes in check. You gotta admit it worked rather well … .
The aboriginal race has died out in the South and is dying fast in the North and West even where most gently treated. Other races are to be excluded by legislation if they are tinted to any degree.
How many pure blood aborigines are left? The only way to preserve the aboriginal race is to henceforth prohibit interbreeding. Does it even matter that the oldest civilization is vanishing? That should be a good thing.
John H.
20 Jan 12 at 9:09 pm
Indo-Aryans, I believe…
P.S. Black?
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 9:13 pm
BTW, here’s a guy who makes his living standing around in the sun.
Black?
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 9:30 pm
Most Indians are black, yes.
Here’s crowd pic of thousands of BLACK and darkish Indians making fun of the slightly dark Australian cricketer Andrew Symonds as a “monkey.”
C.L.
20 Jan 12 at 9:40 pm
Black?
And finally:
Black?
FFS, racism is a scourge.
And yet nowadays it’s almost uniquely adhered to and propagated by our beloved ‘progressives’.
Thanks for all the fabricated division, you destructive, petulant idiots!
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 9:41 pm
Yes CL, as shameful an episode of blatant bigotry as you’d ever have the misfortune to witness (I saw it live on Foxtel at the time, BTW).
Did the lobotomised leftist lamestream meeja™ pee their panties over it, though?
Not on your nellie – in fact I’d argue it led eventually to (the not yet) dead roebuck’s extraordinary attack on ponting after the Sydney test of 2008, so desperate was the need to dissemble.
Scumbags.
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 9:52 pm
Oi – what happened to my comment above the most recent one – wasn’t even warned it was going into moderation!
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 9:54 pm
Oopsie!
So why was the comment moderated?
For mentioning the behrendt?
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 10:22 pm
Hi Graeme
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:13 pm
Oh yea, hi Bird.
nice to see you back here as always.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 11:17 pm
Graeme
Why on earth have you chosen Lord Haw Haw as a moniker?
You do realise he was hanged as a traitor and deservedly so, don’t you?
This won’t exactly help your reputation for deranged anti-semitism either.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:18 pm
The last words of William Joyce, aka Lord Haw Haw, Graeme Bird’s new hero:
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:21 pm
Spoken, I should add, before he was hanged for treason.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:22 pm
Hey Avian – we’ve a cage match lined up fo’ ya!
Your good feathered self V a stupid fractional reserve banker bought boomer hippie scumbag™…
Auburnon looks noice!
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 11:23 pm
Be that as it may, but lets say the hanging was out of order, why would you be the traitors name as a moniker.
And there is no lying allowed at this blog Bird.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 11:25 pm
What does that loony old bint Ayn Rand have to do with it?
Joyce got what he deserved, just like the Cossacks and SS camp followers got what they deserved in Operation Keelhaul.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:27 pm
badm0f0
20 Jan 12 at 11:28 pm
Just was watching a doco on sbs about the brit navy that involved hanging an admiral on his quarter deck in the 7-year war, circe 1750. Sure put lead in their pencil for what came next..
Hmm I love the smell of hemp in the morning..
Lazlo
20 Jan 12 at 11:32 pm
Graeme, why do you hate the Jews so much?
What have they done to you?
Are there even any Jews in Gosford at all?
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:33 pm
Well Graeme is really hitting the turps hard tonight.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:34 pm
so bird, at a time of all out war, you believe Haw Haw was just expressing an opinion rather than attempting to demoralize the population with propaganda.
You moron.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 11:36 pm
He drinks heavily most nights and then starts posting abusive crap over the web about someone or allows his trannie to use his house of horrors to post slanderous filth.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 11:39 pm
Graeme, you are drunk.
Tone it down or Sinc will have to call in the AFP.
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:39 pm
Lord Gra Gra – put your energy to good use against the Quig Gon Jon.
He senses your anger.
Don’t let your hatred destroy you.
Resist, arise and destroy him, boidy!
You know the stupid ol hippie fractionalist is beggin’ fo’ it!
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 11:40 pm
Bird
You’re drunk. Go to bed.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 11:42 pm
Graeme
You have been back at the Cat for 15 minutes and already you are ranting about niggers, wops and Jews and advocating sedition and treason and making spurious allegations of war crimes.
Do you not understand why your dumb arse keeps getting itself banned?
Les Majesty
20 Jan 12 at 11:44 pm
Bird V the Quig Gon Jon
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 11:44 pm
Umm What is our view on the latest editorial in The Times, M’Lord Haw Haw?
Lazlo
20 Jan 12 at 11:44 pm
So, Bird, are we still on the mass sacking route then?
Lazlo
20 Jan 12 at 11:48 pm
Who might they be, massa boidy?
Rabz
20 Jan 12 at 11:54 pm
Bird, you’re drunk. Go away.
JC
20 Jan 12 at 11:57 pm
Graeme, stop making a fool of yourself.
Go to bed.
Gab
20 Jan 12 at 11:59 pm
“Chosen Peoples Knowledges”.
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 12:02 am
Graeme, sweetheart, tell us all about it tomorrow. But for now
go to bed.
Gab
21 Jan 12 at 12:05 am
Night Night Birdie. Time for a little sleep now. Have some Lizzie hot milk and honey and off perchance to dream.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
21 Jan 12 at 12:06 am
So I’ve gone from being a ‘chosen peepleses’ to a mere ”oose n*gger’ in the space of about, oh fifteen minutes?!?!
Am I capable of ‘transformismos’, or what, peeple?!?
Tanks, Gra Gra!
Rabz
21 Jan 12 at 12:07 am
“I sez you could be over here with me.”
Thanks, but no thanks. I’ve had enough abuse from your resident harridan.
Now, go to sleep.
Gab
21 Jan 12 at 12:21 am
Gosh, girls, how can you refuse an invitation like that?
steve from brisbane
21 Jan 12 at 12:22 am
Not this piece of shit again.
Abu Chowdah
21 Jan 12 at 1:33 am
A cute anecdote from Christopher Hitchens on Margaret Thatcher:
Frank
21 Jan 12 at 1:35 am
Sinclair is Jewish? That explains a lot.
m0nty
21 Jan 12 at 4:08 am
Bird is out of here, again
Sinclair Davidson
21 Jan 12 at 4:59 am
Go to bed, Sinc!
m0nty
21 Jan 12 at 5:23 am
Why? Too early for bed.
Sinclair Davidson
21 Jan 12 at 5:46 am
Then don’t get up so early!
m0nty
21 Jan 12 at 5:51 am
I don’t think we can be so definitive about ‘the greatest woman of the 20th century’. Maybe Thatcher will be remembered, but Marie Curie was a 20th century female who will be remembered for all time and for my money towers over Thatcher. And so too would I rate Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland. Or Ayn Rand. Or Dorothy Hodgkin. Or Simone de Beauvoir.
No, Steve, the greatest woman of the 20th century must be one who will be remembered in the 30th century and Margaret Thatcher will not be that woman. It is more likely to be Marie Curie or Maria Callas.
Samuel J
21 Jan 12 at 6:53 am
Greatest woman, maybe, but as pointed out above, the greatest person of the 20th century is Norman Borlaug, no question.
Quentin George
21 Jan 12 at 8:41 am
do the British Left have a UK candidate for The greatest woman of the twentieth century.
Jim Rose
21 Jan 12 at 12:02 pm
Samuel J
Your list looks very like the list on The Ten Greatest Women of the Twentieth Century that was put up on the web on 30 August 2011, more than a decade after the century had ended. It is the only other website to even have raised the question. I looked at it when I was doing my own research, and it seemed very suspiciously like the “Ten Greatest Lefty Women But Leaving Out Margaret Thatcher while Including Ayn Rand so No One Can Say I’m Biased”. Here is the list in order:
1) Marie Curie
Dorthy Hogkin
2) Margaret Sanger
3) Indira Gandhi
4) Rosa Parks
5) Rachel Carson
6) Emmeline Pankhurst
7) Simone de Beauvoir
9) Ayn Rand
10) Eleanor Roosevelt
I had originally thought of Marie Curie as the only serious alternative but nothing she discovered would have remained undiscovered had she not made the discovery. And to include Indira Gandhi without even mentioning Margaret Thatcher really does give the game away.
Margaret Thatcher is the indispensible person. She personally made all the difference in the way that Churchill and Roosevelt made all the difference.
Steve Kates
21 Jan 12 at 2:01 pm
John
50-100,000 tops.
Impossible. Australian Aborigines have been the most exogamic breeders in the world, almost since British settlement.
It is crucial to note here, that the Australian Aborigines never built or lived in a civilisation prior to 1788.
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 2:13 pm
It is pretty pointless to discuss all this stuff unless the revolutionary socio-cognitive shifts involved in moving from a hunter-gatherer society to a settled agricultural society are kept in mind.
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 2:15 pm
Norman Borlaug!? and his “Green Revolution”? When I was at uni, he was treated as the vampire Lestat. I never fell for it though.
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 2:19 pm
Frank’s excerpt by Hitchens is funny and it’s funnier for me as I actually have a similar story.
I’ve mentioned it before but I’ll tell it again…..
Around the mid 90′s our bank hired her to do a dinner presentation to our clients in an intimate setting at a dinner in NYC.
Maggie showed up with her two Scotland yard watchers.
We sat down to dinner and she then gave her speech. It was a pretty conventional talk about the wonders of capitalism. However she proceeded to annoy some of our Asian clients by comparing mainland China to Hong Kong and referring the Hong Kongers as “industrious little people”. she didn’t give a shit though, as it was never meant as an insult.
The fire works started after dinner though. Most people left while Maggie and a few of us stayed on shooting the breeze. I was on my open-borders, no-government schtick at the time so I suggested to her the world would be better off without governments and in fact the state was essentially an evil construct, or some bullshit like that.
Her response was immediate, like a ton of bricks falling on me.
“little boy”, she said, ” you have no idea what you’re talking about. If it wasn’t for the liberal democracies doing their job and confronting pure evil, the world would have sunk into the dark ages of communism and fascism and you would not be enjoying the life you are now. Don’t ever, ever forget that it was the liberal democracies that stood up to these evil systems and we won”.
During the speech, she said that George Bush Senior was going wobbly about repelling Saddam from the invasion of Kuwait in the earlier part of the decade and it was only after she went to see him and talked sense into him that he toughened up. She said to him that Saddam’s action were identical to Hitler’s move on Poland and not only should it not go unpunished but it needed to be squashed.
JC
21 Jan 12 at 2:23 pm
Impossible. Australian Aborigines have been the most exogamic breeders in the world, almost since British settlement.
Thanks Peter, I was just having a dig at the PC crowd by suggesting that if they are really serious about preserving aboriginal culture they would have to do this. I mentioned this to a friend last night and he replied that if they want to preserve their culture we should set aside land areas and completely seal these off from any outside influence.
Yes, strictly speaking there was no aboriginal civilization. +
It is more likely to be Marie Curie or Maria Callas.
Lynn Marguilis(recently deceased): her explanation for the presence of mitochondria in our cells raised important questions about symbiosis in evolution, moving us from the it is all competition Jack to a much more nuanced and balanced view of evolutionary processes.
Barbara McClintock – her work on discovering horizontal gene transfer in maize paved the way for future genetically modified foods.
Germaine Greer!
John H.
21 Jan 12 at 2:25 pm
It is pretty pointless to discuss all this stuff unless the revolutionary socio-cognitive shifts involved in moving from a hunter-gatherer society to a settled agricultural society are kept in mind.
I had a quick dig through my archives last night reviewing some neuro and cognitive studies on aborigines. You’re making an important point Peter, the structural and cognitive differences,. not necessarily genetically driven, have profound implications for the assertion that peoples hunter gatherer tribes in particular are *exactly* like us. It highlights the absurdity of thinking that aborigines can exist in our culture while simultaneously preserving their theirs. Can’t happen.
John H.
21 Jan 12 at 2:29 pm
This has already been tried. It started with the 1970s Land Rights Acts. The effects on those behind the self-imposed barbed wire has been a disaster.
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 2:29 pm
John, one of the key differences between Greer and Thatcher is that thatcher is at least genteel in her senility.
entropy
21 Jan 12 at 2:57 pm
Germaine Greer wrote one notable book, whose success had to do with a snazzy title, a fetching cover and loads of erstwhile zeitgeist insanity. I’ve read the book. It’s embarrassingly stupid.
C.L.
21 Jan 12 at 3:13 pm
Steve – my list only includes a couple from the list you cite – I don’t rate Gandhi at all. And what of Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland – they are not on that list. I don’t think you can say that nothing would have remained undiscovered had not Marie Curie made the discoveries. That’s a bit like saying that Thatcher’s policies would have been achieved without Thatcher. I agree that Thatcher is high on such a list, but I rank Curie and Callas above Thatcher. cheers SJ
Samuel J
21 Jan 12 at 4:38 pm
Rabz
Folks believe that ‘Aryan’ was a Nazi invention. It wasn’t. ‘Arya’ was a Sanskrit word meaning something along the lines of ‘the highest, noble, superior, most pious, whatever’. In contradistinction were the literally untouchable barbar and Mleccha.
In fact, the Sanskrit Arya found its way iton 20th century Nazi ideology via 19th century German philologists who revived Sanskrit, discovering the common source of Indo-European languages, which include Sanskrit, Persian, German, and Greek. Indeed, the ‘Nazi’ swaztika is another direct ancient Hindu borrowing, with the Sanskrit symbol Shakti meaning – once again – something like ‘most holy, elite, the dog’s bollocks’.
Yes, those Hindus have a lot to answer for!
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 5:16 pm
Rosa Parks? She sat on a bus, and it wasn’t even her idea!
New Gold Dream
21 Jan 12 at 6:05 pm
Samuel J
In company with the other list, you had Marie Curie as your century’s greatest woman and you also listed Simone de Beauvoir, Dorothy Hogkin and Ayn Rand. That is an overlap of four out of ten. For myself, I would have put Marie Curie second but have not thought about the other eight other than to say that I would have probably put Beatrice Webb somewhere on my list. What I look for is a woman who was singularly important. That is, you can imagine the world a different place had they not been who they were and undertaken whatever it was they did. That’s why a Joan Sutherland or a Maria Callas could not possibly be on my list. Great singers, sure, but how have they changed the nature of the world and in which ways have they helped to make the world a better place?
Steve Kates
21 Jan 12 at 6:07 pm
ayn rand. please, put a novalist on the list who is well know, rather than a cult figure from the 1950s.
Jim Rose
21 Jan 12 at 7:03 pm
Ayn Rand and Simone de Beauvoir? FMD? Why not Barbarella and Lefty Kim?
Peter Patton
21 Jan 12 at 7:07 pm
Steve – I disagree with putting a politician at the top of the list.
Samuel J
22 Jan 12 at 2:34 am
To qualify my previous point, once one admits that politicians should be awarded the ‘best of the century’ award (as they seem inevitably to be) then one is implicitly agreeing that politicians can (and therefore should) improve our lives. Which is exactly the position of those who think that government should have more control over our lives.
Samuel J
22 Jan 12 at 8:13 am
Samuel
“exactly the position of those who think that government should have more control over our lives.”
This does not have to be true. It should be recognised that a large part of our wealth and freedom comes about due to effective government but this does not mean it must be an overly interferring government. It should also be recognised that you can’t have freedom until you first have wealth. For example an Indian who earns $2 per day has the same political freedoms as an Australian earning $200 per day. The Indian has no freedom because all he can do is eat but he is free to do anything that the Australian can do but can’t afford it.
kelly liddle
22 Jan 12 at 8:41 am
[...] According to Steven Kates at Catallaxy, Mrs Thatcher remains "the gold standard of a conviction politician on the right side of history". But even she couldn’t resist subsidising the car industry when the electoral deck was stacked against her. This entry was posted on Sunday, January 22nd, 2012 at 1:41 PM and filed under Politics – international. Follow comments here with the RSS 2.0 feed. Post a comment or leave a trackback. [...]
Club Troppo » Bailing out British Leyland – The Iron Lady’s feet of clay
22 Jan 12 at 4:41 pm
She was on the right side of history in 1980. So correct were her policy correctives and so energetically did she prosecute them that her followers have been on the wrong side of history since 1990.
The GFC could not have happened but for excesses of Thatcherian virtue. To this day, her acolytes are perpetuating a return to the 1930s in their efforts to avoid a return to the 1970s.
Alphonse
23 Jan 12 at 3:34 pm