Word: british
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...took a job as a research chemist with British Xylonite plastics in Essex and immediately began turning up at local Conservative Party affairs. Impressed Tory officials proposed her as their candidate for Dartford, then a safe Labor seat in Kent. Being chosen as a sacrificial lamb is the classic way to begin a career in British politics, and Margaret eagerly accepted. In the 1950 election Margaret, then 24, was the youngest woman running for Parliament. She lost, but Kingsley Wood, then leader of the Tories on the Dartford Council, recalls that "we all knew she was something different. She worked...
...Airey Neave, who became her campaign manager and one of her closest advisers,?Thatcher stepped boldly into the arena. At a party caucus on Feb. 11, 1975, she defeated the acknowledged favorite, William Whitelaw, 146 to 79, thus becoming the first woman in history to lead a major British political party...
Unlike a U.S. President, a British Prime Minister is the first among supposed equals in the Cabinet. Cajolery is as vital a quality as conviction, and some Tories wonder whether Thatcher has the skills necessary to keep dissident ministers in line. Because of her authoritarian air, she sometimes appears to be rather like a headmistress dealing sternly with rowdy students. In discussions around the shadow cabinet table, says one associate, "she can be very sharp, steely in cutting somebody short if she has lost interest in what is being said...
Although cuts in public spending will be a Tory hallmark, this will not apply to defense. Thatcher wants to improve Britain's nuclear deterrent force, which currently consists of four British-built submarines carrying Polaris A-3 missiles. The Conservatives want to expand the fleet to six, each carrying advanced Trident missiles bought from the U.S. Thatcher is so concerned over growing Soviet power that Tory strategists have considered the formation of a joint U.S.-European fleet based on the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean...
Committed to ties with both the U.S. and Europe, but without any special affection for either, Thatcher in effect is something of a "British Gaullist." She would like to move away from European economic and monetary union but toward a single foreign and defense policy for the European Community. Although Thatcher is personally a strong backer of Israel, Tory policy is likely to be more pro-Arab than under Callaghan. There are also strong indications that Thatcher will promptly authorize the sale of 250 or so Harrier jet fighters to China, a move that will both outrage the Soviets...