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Allies of former prime minister regard darling of Tea Party movement as a frivolous figure unworthy of an audience Sarah Palin wants to show to the Republican right that she is the true keeper of the Ronald Reagan flame by meeting the late president's closest ally on the world stage.

Brace yourself London: #Palin is coming your way http://thetim.es/lx85ns (£)

The Queen will lead the celebration of the oldest and highest order of British chivalry founded more than 650 years ago. The Knights of the Order of the Garter, created by Edward III in 1348, will gather in their ceremonial feathered hats and robes at Windsor Castle next month for the annual procession to St George’s Chapel. But there will be one conspicuous absentee from the line-up of 26 knights, who include Prince Philip, Prince William, the Duke of Westminster, former Prime Minister Sir John Major and Lord Sainsbury, president of the supermarket chain. Baroness Thatcher, who was elevated to...

Friends of Margaret Thatcher last night voiced their concern over the ex-Prime Minister’s growing frailty. Baroness Thatcher turned down an invitation to the Royal Wedding because of her health and has made no public appearances for nearly two months. The next event in her diary is the unveiling of a statue to her ally and close friend, former US President Ronald Reagan, in London on July 4. But there are fears that she could also miss that. ..... The Mail on Sunday has also learned that the Government will meet the full cost of a State funeral for Baroness Thatcher....

The first picture has been released of Meryl Streep playing Baroness Thatcher in The Iron Lady, the forthcoming Hollywood film about the former British prime minister's life. The biopic, which also stars Jim Broadbent as Lady Thatcher's husband Sir Denis, began filming at the end of January. It is being made by Pathe and Film4 and is directed by British director Phyllida Lloyd, who is best known for her theatre work. Streep, one of the most successful actresses in Hollywood, was seen as one of the few women capable of convincingly playing Lady Thatcher. However, producers faced concerns over how...

Link only, the Foundation seems to have rather strict copyright details.

Sarah Palin is planning her first real foreign trip—a move that could burnish her foreign policy credentials in advance of a 2012 presidential run. The Daily Beast has learned that Sarah Palin will be traveling overseas in the new year. At the top of the list: Israel and England, both countries she has said she wanted to travel to in the past. The schedule and itinerary is still fluid, but an overseas trip in 2011 will boost her foreign policy credentials, something she can turn to in a potential 2012 presidential run. Up to now Palin’s travel outside of North...

EXCERPT Former Alaska Gov. Palin , a vocal advocate of the Tea Party movement, jumped into the heated race debate Monday night, assailing the NAACP resolution as an example of "typical divisive politics that is so absolutely unnecessary." "The Tea Party movement is a beautiful movement, full of diverse people, diverse backgrounds," Palin said on Fox News' "Hannity." "It's very unfortunate that they are taking this tactic because it's a false accusation that Tea Party Americans are racist. Any good American hates racism. We don't stand for it. It is unacceptable." Palin in turn called on President Obama and first...

According to its website, the Labour party stands for “social justice”, “strong community and strong values”, “reward for hard work”, “decency” and “rights matched by responsibilities”. Meanwhile, just this afternoon, the Labour party leadership hopeful John McDonnell has said that he would like to visit the 1980s and “assassinate Thatcher”. *** That’s the difference between the centre-Right and the Left. We view our opponents as misguided, foolish or economically illiterate; socialists view their opponents as evil obstacles to progress – no wonder that in just half a century, socialism managed to kill more people than all the world’s religions combined,...

Lady Thatcher responded that “in her view all those who wrote letters in this sense should be invited to accept one into their homes," the minutes disclose. "She thought it quite wrong that immigrants should be given council housing whereas white citizens were not." Lady Thatcher asked what the implications of such a move could be given that an exodus of the white population from Rhodesia – now Zimbabwe – was expected once majority rule was established. She made clear, however, that she had "less objection to refugees such as Rhodesians, Poles and Hungarians, since they could more easily be...

Baroness Thatcher has spent the night in hospital after breaking her arm in a fall. The former Conservative Prime Minister tripped in her bedroom at home in London this morning, fracturing a bone near her shoulder. Doctors decided to keep Lady Thatcher overnight at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital as a precaution. Friends said the former leader - dubbed the Iron Lady for her steely determination - was 'very lucky' to escape more serious injury. 'She tripped over at home this morning and has broken a bone in her upper arm,' Lady Thatcher's official spokeswoman said. 'It's a simple fracture,...

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is recovering after breaking her arm in a fall. Thatcher's office said the 83-year-old politician fractured a bone in her upper arm after tripping at home early Friday.

Tory grandees gathered to honour the 30th anniversary of Lady Thatcher’s historic election victory last night as David Cameron said the next Conservative administration would seek to emulate the way she rescued Britain from a failing Labour government. The Tory leader, who was unable to attend the event, paid tribute to Britain’s greatest postwar leader as more than 270 guests gathered at the Carlton Club in London's St James's Street, for the biggest dinner the Club has hosted in more than two decades. Golden lady: Baroness Margaret Thatcher leaves the Carlton Club in London following the party to celebrate the...

The video, located here, is an inspirational video for all conservatives.

Carol Thatcher has hit back over her 'Golli-gate' sacking and compared Britain with communist East Germany. She refused to apologise for calling a French tennis player a 'golliwog' and claimed people were 'far too easily offended in modern society'. 'Ironically, it's like we're back 20 years ago before the fall of the Berlin Wall in Germany,' she told Channel 5's The Wright Stuff.

As her special adviser in Downing Street, he played a vital role in two of the most important episodes of her premiership. In 1981 he was brought back from academia to stiffen her resolve in pushing though a budget that cut public spending during a recession, the decisive break with the Keynesian past.

Conservatives of a fatalistic bent -- their numbers this month have swollen -- like to depress themselves with the maxim that government programs never perish. Statism's relentless march can be checked at times but rarely beaten back. Just look, they say, at those New Deal relics known as farm programs. And then they see Time magazine's cover this week -- Barack Obama pictured as FDR, with the cover line "The New New Deal" -- and they head for the window ledge. [snip] But the greatest refutation of their dour outlook can be expressed in a single name: Margaret Thatcher. When...

She may no longer make speeches, on doctor's orders, but there is no keeping Lady Thatcher away from her public. From the moment she clambered shakily from the back seat of a black Jaguar, on to the forecourt of the Grosvenor House Hotel, London, this was going to be her night. At 83, and reportedly suffering from dementia, she makes few public appearances these days. But this was a special occasion - the 20th anniversary dinner of the Bruges Group, which takes its name from a speech in which she first warned against the creation of a European "super state"....

1 hour, 31 minutes ago LONDON (Reuters) - Former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher -- once known as one of the world's most formidable political minds -- has been suffering from dementia for the past seven years, according to her daughter, Carol. Carol Thatcher tells in her memoirs of how her 82-year-old mother, nicknamed the "Iron Lady" for her tough reputation, often struggles to remember things and repeats questions. In a memoir serialized in the Mail on Sunday newspaper, her daughter paints a picture of a very different woman from the political heavyweight who strutted the world stage in the...

The daughter of British former prime minister Margaret Thatcher tells how her mother's dementia has left her struggling to remember the simplest facts in book extracts published Sunday. Carol Thatcher wrote that, on her worst days, her mother struggles to finish sentences but shows occasional glimpses of her old self, particularly when talking about her time in Downing Street. "I had always thought of her as ageless, timeless and 100 percent cast-iron damage-proof," Carol Thatcher wrote in her memoir, "A Swim-On Part In The Goldfish Bowl", which was serialised in the Mail on Sunday newspaper. "Whereas previously you never had...