The Last Soviet

"Gentlemen, comrades, do not be concerned about all you hear about Glasnost and Perestroika and democracy in the coming years. They are primarily for outward consumption. There will be no significant internal changes in the Soviet Union, other than for cosmetic purposes. Our purpose is to disarm the Americans and let them fall asleep."

Mikhail Gorbachev

November 1987

Mikhail Gorbachev died today, and the Western media is celebrating him as the man who ended the Cold War.  What about Reagan?  No, he was the man who might have nuked the world and only Gorbachev saved us.  How is it that the leader of a totalitarian state has long been hailed as a peacemaker while his democratically elected opponents - Reagan & Thatcher - are painted as dangerous extremists?  The fact is that Gorbachev had the misfortune of coming to power during the final decline of the Soviet system.  He lost the Cold War, but the Democrat and Labour opponents of Reagan and Thatcher weren't about to give them credit.  No, the hagiographies were composed for the loser.  For years, Reagan's refrain was 'We win, you lose,' to the Soviets.  The US economy dwarfed the Soviet economy, and an arms race was like Usain Bolt racing a 10-year-old.  Efforts to keep pace could only result in bankruptcy for the USSR.  Then there was Chernobyl.  That disaster changed the dialogue.  Even Gorbachev decried the shoddy workmanship in the Soviet Union, admitting failings that prior leaders spent decades denying.  While the Soviet people view Gorbachev negatively, he has been quite popular in the West.  By presiding over the destruction of the nation he led, he received a Nobel Prize (1990).  The man who wanted to save Soviet communism, and failed, was lionized.  In retrospect, that was a fair trade.  Even Reagan would agree.

“There is no limit to the amount of good you can do if you don't care who gets the credit.”

Ronald Reagan

"The role of Ronald Reagan had been deliberately diminished; the role of the Europeans, who, with the exception of Helmet Kohl, were often keen to undermine America when it mattered, had been sanitized; and the role of Mr. Gorbachev, who had failed spectacularly in his declared objective of saving communism and the Soviet Union, had been absurdly misunderstood."

Margaret Thatcher

The Iron Lady

This biopic of the conservative titan, Margaret Thatcher, spends most of its time on her struggles with Alzheimer's.  Thus, her political triumphs of the past are merely interruptions in her imaginary conversations with her dead husband.  Here is a movie about a crazy lady who lives alone.  All that is missing is a dozen cats.

It takes at least 15 minutes before the movie starts looking at her career.  Instead, she is shown wandering her house, confused and bewildered.  She has conversations with her dead husband, listens to her staff whisper about how she's lost her mind, and otherwise paints Mrs. Thatcher as a tragic and unhappy figure.  See, this is what you get for being a conservative.

Finally, the movie looks back at her roots.  Her father was a grocer and a mayor, who thought people should support themselves.  Margaret is looked down upon by the uppercrust for having been a grocer's daughter.  She married businessman Dennis Thatcher after her unsuccessful bid for Parliament in 1950.  They had twins before she finally won a seat in 1959.  Her climb within the conservative party is glossed over, simply showing her as Minister of Education before jumping to leader of the party and finally Prime Minister.  Her nearly 12 years as PM are told in flashes, pausing for her fight against Trade Unions, IRA bombings, the Falkland War, and her resignation after being challenged for leadership.  Those who don't know much about her might have trouble understanding what the big deal is.  Why does she deserve a biopic?

When Dennis proposed to her, she warned him that she was not going to be some stay at home wife who ended her days by washing teacups.  We had early seen her mother doing exactly that.  No, she was going to make a difference.  But, when the film concludes, Mrs. Thatcher washes her teacup at the sink before wandering the halls of her empty house, shuffling aimlessly.  See, all her efforts were worthless.  She still washed the teacup in the end.  Ha!  Take that, you old bat!

Meryl Streep does an outstanding job of portraying Thatcher but the script is a travesty.  A few good lines from Thatcher are included to assuage her supporters but mostly we see a confused old lady.  Maybe she was confused all along is the subtext.  Here is the most significant woman politician of the 20th century in a film directed by a woman and yet she gets torpedoed like an Argentinian cruiser.