Watch the Thatcher funeral procession

One of the country's Prime Ministers died last week, and if you haven't heard about it already, it turns out that some people really liked her, others didn't and a few were even of no opinion at all. Your author tends to quite admire elected politicians of any party for putting themselves in the firing line by stepping up to give it a try, and it doesn't seem out of order to try to mark the deaths of the Prime Ministers we elected in a similar way to those of the Royals we didn't.


Today, London will come to a halt for a little while to do this, and we're told to expect Big Ben to stop chiming as well, which seems a fitting tribute to someone who was once the most senior member of staff in what is ultimately just a building. Perhaps £10 million seems a bit much, but it's less than the cost of some town houses in Notting Hill, and maybe it will be worth it to remind the gathered masses of the world's media of the importance of Great Britain, of Thatcher's role in negotiating towards the end of the Cold War, and of our abilities to do pomp and ceremony with style.

Democracy needs people who are willing to devote their lives to trying to do things that they believe are best for their community, for society and for the country as a whole, and those who dislike what a politician has done should, although they are perfectly entitled to protest thanks to the rights that have been protected by elected politicians throughout the generations, perhaps consider instead putting time and effort into developing their own ideas of how to make the country a better place, and then spend many years of their life trying to get elected based on those ideas.

For full details of today's events, see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22096613

_{^Picture © UK Parliament used under a Creative Commons license^}