"Margaret Thatcher would be tarred today as a "big government liberal" and a "European socialist" by

[pampango]

today's republican presidential candidates."

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/02/23/if_the_iron_lady_watched_the_republican_debates__113215.html

It's a good thing that the Margaret Thatcher we remember isn't running for president as a Republican. A conservative icon, she would nonetheless be tarred today as a "big government liberal," "raiser of taxes," "European socialist" and RINO, which stands for Republican in Name Only.

Republican foes of government guaranteed health coverage habitually refer to "Obamacare" as "socialized medicine." It is no such thing. The health care system envisioned by the reforms is far more conservative than Medicare. And Medicare isn't socialized medicine, either: It is socialized insurance. The government picks up the bills, but doctors and hospitals still work for themselves.

Britain's National Health Service is socialized medicine. The providers do work for the government. And Thatcher barely touched a hair on it. Moreover, she defended it with passion. In her book "Margaret Thatcher: the Downing Street Years," she wrote this: "I believed that the NHS was a service of which we could genuinely be proud. It delivered a high quality of care -- especially when it came to acute illnesses -- and at a reasonably modest unit cost, at least compared with some insurance-based systems."

Thatcher didn't believe that tax cuts would automatically pay for themselves with economic growth. That's why she combined reducing Britain's income-tax rates with a significantly higher value-added tax. A VAT is a kind of national sales tax. Thatcher explained the move as shifting taxation from earnings to spending. This was tax code surgery, not exorcism powered by magical thinking.

[Ichingcarpenter]

1. RealClear politics is a right wing site

interesting...But I don't even agree with the article

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RealClearPolitics

[pampango]

2. It's certainly a right wing site. I found their take on Thatcher interesting.

What do you disagree with in the article?