https://www.yahoo.com/news/long-serving-utah-senator-orrin-010200707.html

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Orrin G. Hatch, the longest-serving Republican
senator in history who was a fixture in Utah politics for more than four
decades, died Saturday at age 88.

His death was announced in a statement from his foundation, which did
not specify a cause.

A staunch conservative on most economic and social issues, he also
teamed with Democrats several times during his long career on issues
ranging from stem cell research to rights for people with disabilities
to expanding children’s health insurance. He also formed friendships
across the aisle, particularly with the late Democratic Sen. Edward M.
Kennedy.

Hatch also championed GOP issues like abortion limits and helped shape
the U.S. Supreme Court, including defending Justice Clarence Thomas
against sexual harassment allegations during confirmation hearings.

He later became an ally of Republican President Donald Trump, using his
role as chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee to get a major
rewrite of the U.S. tax codes to the president’s desk. In return, Trump
helped Hatch deliver on a key issue for Republicans in Utah with a
contentious move to drastically downsize two national monuments that had
been declared by past presidents.

Hatch retired in 2019. Through Trump had encouraged him to run again,
the longtime senator would have faced a tough primary battle and had
promised to retire. Hatch instead stepped aside and encouraged
Republican Mitt Romney, a critic of the former president, to run to
replace him.

“Few men have made their mark on the Senate as he did,” Romney wrote in
a tribute to his friend and predecessor, praising his “vision and
legislative accomplishment.” Utah's Sen. Mike Lee, for his part, called
Hatch “a friend, a mentor and an example to me and countless others.”

Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky,
praised Hatch's legislative acumen.

"Orrin’s decades of leadership drove an unending catalog of major
legislative accomplishments and landmark confirmations," McConnell said
in a statement. "He entered the Senate as a young principled
conservative in the 1970s when the modern conservative movement was in
its infancy. He held to his principles his whole career, and applied
them to issues like the historic 2017 tax reform law and the work of the
Judiciary Committee to the enormous benefit of our country."

Hatch was also noted for his side career as a singer and recording
artist of music with themes of his religious faith, The Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints.

He is survived by his wife, Elaine, and their six children.

Hatch came to the Senate after a 1976 election win and went onto become
the longest-serving senator in Utah history, winning a seventh term in
2012. He became the Senate president pro tempore in 2015 when
Republicans took control of the Senate. The position made him third in
the line of presidential succession behind then-Vice President Joe Biden
and the Speaker of the House. His tenure places him as the longest GOP
senator, behind several Democrats.

One issue Hatch returned to over the course of his career was limiting
or outlawing abortion, a position that put him at the center of one of
the nation's most controversial issues. He was the author of a variety
of “Hatch amendments” to the Constitution aimed at diminishing the
availability of abortions.

In 1991, he became known as one of Thomas's most vocal defenders against
sexual harassment allegations from law professor Anita Hill. Hatch read
aloud at the confirmation hearings from “The Exorcist,” and he suggested
that Hill stole details from the book.

While unquestionably conservative, there were times Hatch differed from
many of his conservative colleagues — including then-President George W.
Bush when Hatch pushed for federal funding of embryonic stem cell research.

In 1997, Hatch joined Kennedy in sponsoring a $24 billion program for
states to provide health insurance to the children of low-income parents
who don’t qualify for Medicaid.

“He exemplified a generation of lawmakers brought up on the principles
of comity and compromise, and he embodied those principles better than
anyone,” said Hatch Foundation chairman A. Scott Anderson in a
statement. “In a nation divided, Orrin Hatch helped show us a better way
by forging meaningful friendships on both sides of the aisle. Today,
more than ever, we would do well to follow his example.”

Hatch also helped usher through legislation toughening child pornography
laws and making illegally downloading music a prosecutable crime.

For Hatch, the music-download issue was a personal one. A member of the
faith widely known as Mormon, he frequently wrote religious songs and
recorded music in his spare time as a way to relax from the stresses of
life in Washington. Hatch earned about $39,000 in royalties from his
songs in 2005.

One of his songs, “Unspoken,” went platinum after appearing on “WOW Hits
2005,” a compilation of Christian pop music.

In 2000, Hatch sought the Republican nomination for president, saying he
had more experience in Washington than his opponents and that he could
work with Democrats. Hatch readily acknowledged that winning would be a
long shot. He withdrew from the race after only winning 1 percent of the
vote in the Iowa caucuses and then endorsed George W. Bush.

He became a strong opponent of President Barack Obama’s 2009 health care
law after pulling out of early bipartisan talks on the legislation. At
one point, he said of the legislation: “It is 2,074 pages long. It is
enough to make you barf.”

Hatch faced a tough re-election battle from a conservative candidate in
2012, two years after a tea party wave carried longtime Utah Republican
Sen. Bob Bennett out of office. Both Bennett and Hatch voted in favor of
a 2008 bank bailout that rankled those on the far right.

Whatever you thought of the late Hatch's politics--and I liked most of his policy positions, for sure--no one could deny that on TV he always looked dandy in some dapper pressed-suit, a fancy dress shirt and perfectly-knotted neckwear; nice if we all appeared so professional whenever in the public eye.

Plus, in his frequent interviews on cable shows as well as the Sunday morning big-net broadcasts, the handsome Hatch invariably struck me as a quite genial and even-tempered fellow.

BRYAN STYBLE/Florida

On Saturday, April 23, 2022 at 8:04:27 PM UTC-7, Turd Ferguson wrote:

> In 2000, Hatch sought the Republican nomination for president, saying he
> had more experience in Washington than his opponents and that he could
> work with Democrats. Hatch readily acknowledged that winning would be a
> long shot. He withdrew from the race after only winning 1 percent of the
> vote in the Iowa caucuses and then endorsed George W. Bush.
>

How did this all go so wrong, why did no one think he was fit for president

In article <d34fd320-0e43-4fec-a46d-f3750f7e5c7en@googlegroups.com>,
Topic Cop <Beaver_Fever@live.com> wrote:
>On Saturday, April 23, 2022 at 8:04:27 PM UTC-7, Turd Ferguson wrote:
>
>> In 2000, Hatch sought the Republican nomination for president, saying he
>> had more experience in Washington than his opponents and that he could
>> work with Democrats. Hatch readily acknowledged that winning would be a
>> long shot. He withdrew from the race after only winning 1 percent of the
>> vote in the Iowa caucuses and then endorsed George W. Bush.
>>
>
>How did this all go so wrong, why did no one think he was fit for president

It is true. No Republican since Ike has been fit to be US president.

--
(Cruz certainly has an odd face) ... it looks like someone sewed pieces of a
waterlogged Reagan mask together at gunpoint ...

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/how-america-made-donald-trump-unstoppable-20160224

In article <t437rf$3bikc$1@news.xmission.com>, Kenny McCormack
<gazelle@shell.xmission.com> wrote:

> In article <d34fd320-0e43-4fec-a46d-f3750f7e5c7en@googlegroups.com>,
> Topic Cop <Beaver_Fever@live.com> wrote:
> >On Saturday, April 23, 2022 at 8:04:27 PM UTC-7, Turd Ferguson wrote:
> >
> >> In 2000, Hatch sought the Republican nomination for president, saying he
> >> had more experience in Washington than his opponents and that he could
> >> work with Democrats. Hatch readily acknowledged that winning would be a
> >> long shot. He withdrew from the race after only winning 1 percent of the
> >> vote in the Iowa caucuses and then endorsed George W. Bush.
> >>
> >
> >How did this all go so wrong, why did no one think he was fit for president
>
> It is true. No Republican since Ike has been fit to be US president.

Ike could have had the Democratic nomination in 1948 if he'd wanted it.
He probably could have had it in 1952 as well, but he finally decided
he was a Republican.

In article <240420220729133478%nope@noway.com>, A Friend <A Friend> wrote:
>In article <t437rf$3bikc$1@news.xmission.com>, Kenny McCormack
><gazelle@shell.xmission.com> wrote:
>
>> In article <d34fd320-0e43-4fec-a46d-f3750f7e5c7en@googlegroups.com>,
>> Topic Cop <Beaver_Fever@live.com> wrote:
>> >On Saturday, April 23, 2022 at 8:04:27 PM UTC-7, Turd Ferguson wrote:
>> >
>> >> In 2000, Hatch sought the Republican nomination for president, saying he
>> >> had more experience in Washington than his opponents and that he could
>> >> work with Democrats. Hatch readily acknowledged that winning would be a
>> >> long shot. He withdrew from the race after only winning 1 percent of the
>> >> vote in the Iowa caucuses and then endorsed George W. Bush.
>> >>
>> >
>> >How did this all go so wrong, why did no one think he was fit for president
>>
>> It is true. No Republican since Ike has been fit to be US president.
>
>
>Ike could have had the Democratic nomination in 1948 if he'd wanted it.
>He probably could have had it in 1952 as well, but he finally decided
>he was a Republican.

I'm sure the current leader of the Republican party would call him a RINO
(if Ike were still alive).

--
Shikata ga nai...