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There can be no doubt about history's relevance today. It is relevant because people think it is. Almost daily we are regaled with historical 'parallels' and 'lessons'. Teddy Taylor in the Guardian, for example, conjures up the ghost of Oliver Cromwell in order to plead the case of General Zia of Pakistan. Ken Livingstone compares British policy in Ireland to the Nazi holocaust. Mrs Thatcher sees herself as another Churchill. Government ministers tell us that history 'teaches' all kinds of things: that individual hard work and thrift produce prosperity; that nuclear disarmament will encourage Soviet aggression; and that new technologies invariably create jobs in the long term. All the main political parties promise what one unkind critic suggested should be the Social Democratic Party's slogan: 'A Better Yesterday'. In fact the SDP's yesterday is the most recent: the Britain of around ten years ago, before Militant, and when Dr Owen single-handedly foiled the Argentines.