11 June,2011 07:56 AM IST | | Agencies
Right-wingers voice anger at claims that Baroness' aides vetoed a meeting with former Alaska governor Because she is "nuts"
A firestorm on the US right has erupted after it was reported that Sarah Palin will be denied a meeting with Lady Thatcher on the grounds that it would be "belittling" for her to meet the darling of the Tea Party movement. Rush Limbaugh, the talk show host, denounced the suggestion that the former Prime Minister might take a dim view of Mrs Palin as "preposterous". Other supporters of the likely presidential candidate complained online that Lady Thatcher's aides had "disgraced" her.
Snubbed by mentor: Sarah Palin has always described Margaret
Thatcher as her role model. File pics/Getty images
Palin, the darling of the right wing Tea Party, has described Margaret Thatcher as one of her "political heroines" and repeatedly expressed her desire for a meeting. She disclosed recently that she is planning to stop off in London on her way to Sudan later this summer and said she hoped to arrange an interview.u00a0A photo opportunity with Lady Thatcher could help earn Palin important political capital, not least because of the former prime minister's close ties to Ronald Reagan.
Lady Thatcher is expected to make a public appearance at the US Embassy on July 4 to unveil a statue of the late president to mark the centenary of his birth. But sources close to the former PM are said to be anxious to avoid any such meeting taking place. One aide was quoted as saying: "Lady Thatcher will not be seeing Sarah Palin. "That would be belittling for Margaret - Sarah Palin is nuts." After the comments were picked up in US publications, Limbaugh opened his showwith a discussion of the issue. "This is preposterous." "Back in the day, Thatcher would in no way allow an aide to refer to anybody, Sarah Palin notwithstanding, as 'nuts'," he said.
