And finally…Dolla, dolla bill, Maggie?

Jeb Bush, the US Republican presidential hopeful and brother of former gaff-prone president George W. Bush, has floated the bizarre idea of putting the face of former UK Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, on the nation’s new $10 bill.

The former Florida governor’s suggestion came during a televised debate between rival Republicans presidential candidates.

All 11 were asked who they would choose, now the US Treasury has announced plans to put a woman on the redesigned note.

Mr Bush’s choice drew applause as Thatcher remains a darling of the American right seen as she is as the UK leader who unleashed the free market, beat the unions and went to war with the bad guys, according to Michael Goldfarb, an American journalist in London.

“I would go with Ronald Reagan’s partner, Margaret Thatcher,” Mr Bush said, noting it was “probably illegal” and unlikely to happen because she is not American.

But he added: “A strong leader is what we need in the White House, and she certainly was a strong leader that restored the United Kingdom into greatness.”

He was not the only Republican to pick a foreigner to grace the new note, which comes into circulation in 2020.

Mother Teresa was the choice of Ohio Senator John Kasich.

Two candidates picked civil rights heroine Rosa Parks, while rising star Carly Fiorina dismissed the question as gesture politics.

The endurance of the high esteem in which she was held was illustrated in 2009, when the US House of Representatives passed a resolution “recognizing the 30th anniversary of the election of Margaret Thatcher as the first female Prime Minister of Great Britain.”