Funnily enough I recall having a similar ‘Armageddon wake up call’ opinion to Thatcher’s

1979 election, smugly wearing my ‘don’t blame me, I didn’t vote Tory’ badge with pride.
Selling off our social housing, privatising anything that moved - at the time folks who bought their council houses or their BG shares thought these were wonderful policies. To my thinking they have been unmitigated disasters, but since then I’ve come to recognise a few things:
1 Never to underestimate the electorates gullibility to short term bribes
2 Never to underestimate it’s ability to fall for escape goats (so long as it’s not them!)
3. It’s pretty impossible to underestimate the understanding of history amongst the population as a whole, or inability to see any relevance to today beyond crude Churchillian/Dunkirk bombast.

Robert Tressells really had it sussed over a hundred years ago. Anyone reading the Ragged Trousered Philanthropist should hopefully be able to see parallels throughout the years since - especially regarding the role of the media and the use of ‘patriotism ‘ as a huge smokescreen.

Posted By: Tressells Broadbrush, Mar 21, 17:53:08