George W. Bush is a Retread of Maggie Thatcher

There is a slightly greasy, scary feeling to America nowadays which perhaps only a British ex-patriot of a certain age could recognise. In urban belts of decay around downtown bright lights, anarchy symbols and anguished cries like "Justice Now" hastily sprayed across derelict buildings have multiplied in the last couple of years from an occasional feature to a prevalent motif. The sense of alienation from the corridors of power among the poorest-and-getting-poorer, the feeling that apathy is just about to become anger, is almost tangible. To anyone who was there for the second and third terms of the Thatcher administration the sense of deja-vu is overwhelming. And it's not all that surprising.

President Bush and his supporters, echoed by a media which rarely encourages the public to look for it's lessons beyond their own shores, have long trumpeted their connection to the Reagan years. However, a far better parallel would be the other ultra-conservative leader of the 80's, Margaret Thatcher, for this is where Bush's true heritage lies. I am not the only one to notice either. Paul Johnson, radical right-wing journalist and advisor to Thatcher, agrees. The science fiction author, Charles Stross, known for his exceptionally perceptive visions of possible future societies, explored the metaphor in his diary blog as long ago as last summer.

"The leader and their coterie form a tightly-knit community, bound together by a shared ideological outlook and suspicion of outsiders. They don't trust fellow members of their own party who don't fully subscribe to the clique's world-view. They have a set of policies determined by their ideological outlook, and they appear to be pursuing these policies without any interest in the public response to them. They know they're right and they're not interested in protests: proceeding by consensus is seen as weak.
The in-group have strong links to key industrial sectors and their policies promote the well-being of those sectors at the expense of others. They're willing to employ legislation to make an end-run around regulations that hamper the industrial sectors they favour. There is a revolving door between senior members of this group and the boardrooms of the largest companies in the industrial sectors they favour. The major private media organisations (notably Rupert Murdoch's News International) loves them. And say to repeatedly, through all their radio, TV and newspaper channels. They're willing to use strategic tax cuts, even if they're unsustainable, to buy popularity just before an election.
They're socially conservative with a protestant christian religious background, opposed to minority rights, non-traditional gender relationships, gay rights, sex education, quotas, affirmative action, and so on. They take a dualistic black/white view of foreign affairs -- either you're on their side, or you're sleeping with the enemy. As a corollary, they behave publicly as if they believe their domestic political opposition are disloyal -- traitors or stooges of the enemy, or just plaint corrupt and evil -- rather than acting out of principle on the basis of beliefs they don't share with the administration. (They do not believe in the democratic myth of the "loyal opposition".) "

However, along with Stross and I, millions of Britons who didn't happen to share or simply could not afford Thatcher's share-owning ultra-conservative agenda know how this ends. In what follows, imagine America substituted for the United Kingdom. Margaret Thatcher went from being one of the most popular British leaders ever to undoubtably the most hated over the course of her reign. Race riots, poverty riots and protest demonstrations spread like wildfire, put down by a police force she seemed to regard as her own personal brownshirts. Depression, both economic and emotional, hung over the land like a pall.

Ten years later, the country was still struggling to recover from the effects of the Thatcher Years. One of the effects of Thatcherism's splitting of the country into bitter factions was that in her early years the opposition, the Labour Party, only held on to any electoral viability in it's heartlands like Scotland and Wales. As payment for their loyalty, the Scots and Welsh demanded and got devolved government, which many feel will lead inevitably to independence and the breakup of the United Kingdom as these states become States indeed. A nightmare scenario for the American replay could include California repeating history.

There was good news, though. The excesses of the Thatcher government, as they finally fell apart under the caretaker John Major (the only man ever to run away from the circus to become an accountant) made the Conservative Party unelectable in the UK for at least a generation. Twenty five years after her first election win, her Party may well slip into third place. Meanwhile, the left-wing Labour Party has moved more towards the centre, found new and energetic leadership like Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, adopted some of the more sensible conservative policies (like tighter controls on public spending), advocated fiscal responsibility and now have one of the more successful economies in a resurgent Europe. Unfortunately, Mr. Blair seems to have become infected by the same meglomania as Thatcher and Bush, and it remains to be seen if a quiet coup will replace him with, say, Brown.

As America seems to be well on course to repeat the dismal experiments of Thatcher in ultra-conservativism, Americans would do well to remember that history also happens beyond their own shores, and that "those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it."