Terry Glavin Quotes

Slowly but surely the old establishment is being replaced by a new, larger, more meritocratic middle class—a middle class that will include millions of people who traditionally may see themselves as working class but whose ambitions are far broader than their parents and grandparents.

I certainly wasn't a fan of Thatcher's politics. People liked to label us as children of Thatcher. What nonsense. The real children of Thatcher came in the 1990s, and had no interest in politics. The Oasis, Britpop scene.

Spare me this sanctimony about politeness, please. There are millions of people in this country who hate the very word 'Thatcher' and 'Thatcherism,' which continues until this day.

The notion that all human beings born into this world enter at birth into a definite social and economic classification, in which classification they must remain permanently through life, is wholly false and fatal to a progressive civilization.

The prime culprit in causing contemporary social inequality seems to be merit.

Margaret Thatcher was Britain's most controversial modern politician.

If you're dealing with a powerful leader, you're inevitably going to have a dialogue with her political past. It was always my intention to interrogate Thatcher's political life.

One of the nicest things about receiving the accolade of Australia is that, previously, the knighthood was historically for what was termed 'the establishment.' Now, this is an accolade for somebody who comes from a working-class background. Someone whose father was a truck driver and decided to buy a truck.

For better or worse, the people who become leaders and decision makers in politics, law and business are going to come from schools like Princeton.

We in the Labour party owe it to the people we represent to make sure that we offer a choice at the next election between our Labour values and those of the Conservatives.

I had to live and breathe Margaret Thatcher for a few months. I totally engulfed myself in her life. I read her autobiography and a biography, 'The Grocer's Daughter.'

Labor, under their current leadership, want to be the Downtown Abbey party when it comes to educational opportunity. They think working class children should stick to the station in life they were born into - they should be happy to be recognized for being good with their hands and not presume to get above themselves.

This is the first generation to grow up on Thatcher - it's a different ethos. It's money minded, and it's the cult of yourself. Now that's fine, except when it falls down, and you can't achieve your goals - through high unemployment, through the fact that you probably need inherited money to get anywhere.

For us she is not the iron lady. She is the kind, dear Mrs. Thatcher.

I ain't a Communist necessarily, but I been in the red all my life.

I really do think the things that make our society what it is are under threat. It should be about everyone having the potential to be what they're going to be.

For most Americans nepotism is first and last a class issue—a way for the rich to warehouse their unemployable offspring while keeping the lower classes in their place. In fact however systematic nepotism has been practiced more or less continuously by both the upper and the lower classes without ambivalence or apology. It was the middle class that pushed the merit principle, rising as it did through the institutions of the market and the state.

Mrs Thatcher was a mirror-image Marxist. Everything that Marx abhorred she thought was good

Keep up the middle class; lop off aristocracy on the one hand, and a rabble at the other; let the middle class ... have the power.

A populist is someone who sees politics from an economic perspective rather than an ideological perspective. I’m a populist. The only thing that really matters is who is gets screwed and who is doing the screwing.

In a thriving economy, birth need not be destiny.

We once had a society stratified by bloodlines, in which the Protestant Establishment was in one class, immigrants were in another and African-Americans were in another. Now we live in a society stratified by education. In many ways this system is more fair, but as the information economy matures, we are learning it comes with its own brutal barriers to opportunity and ascent.

The gap between aspiration and reality could hardly be wider. Today, the United States has less equality of opportunity than almost any other advanced industrial country. Study after study has exposed the myth that America is a land of opportunity. This is especially tragic: While Americans may differ on the desirability of equality of outcomes, there is near-universal consensus that inequality of opportunity is indefensible.

The financial rewards of economic change have accrued disproportionately to the most talented and well-educated members of society.

That certain groups do much better in America than others—as measured by income, occupational status, test scores and so on – is difficult to talk about.