Baroness Thatcher to receive State Funeral

[Banquo's Ghost]

No, you got it BKS. My bad... I should have dropped the 'paid-for' bit, as it's only slightly relevant who pays for such pomp. Looking at that Wiki link you gave, it looks like US (since our civil war) and Canada have State-Funeralled our chief executives, but UK does not. That still surprises me - I guess because I assumed the UK was all for any reason to have a ceremony - that assumption now proved wrong, at least in the case of your PM's

I guess it makes sense in that your presidents are heads-of-state too, as British kings and queens. Therefore they all get state funerals.

British Prime Ministers are mere functionaries, servants of the Crown, and therefore barely deserve a brief obituary in the classifieds of the Times.

[AntiochusIII]

Hmm. I'm not British myself but I don't see Margaret Thatcher on the same league as those individuals who defeated the likes of Napolean and the Third Reich. And it would seem that this is not a common honor.

Oh well. Not my problem.

[Boohugh]

Hmm. I'm not British myself but I don't see Margaret Thatcher on the same league as those individuals who defeated the likes of Napolean and the Third Reich.

Well, you can argue she helped defeat the USSR, which probably does rate alongside those other achievements in terms of global impact.

Personally, I think she does deserve a State Funeral when she finally pops it because she's clearly had a lasting legacy on British politics and she did bring Britain kicking and screaming through a difficult period, arguably making the country stronger in the long-run.