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Conservative Columnist Charles Krauthammer Dies At 68

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer died yesterday at the age of 68.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

Krauthammer was a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist who wrote a regular column for The Washington Post. He was also a longtime contributor to Fox News.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: You're betraying your whole life if you don't say what you think and you don't say it honestly and bluntly.

GREENE: And he was praised over the years for doing exactly that. He garnered respect from both sides of the aisle.

MARTIN: His friend Peter Wayner wrote in The Washington Post that Charles was not only an elegant writer, quote, "he also had a beautiful mind - precise, logical, subtle and blessedly free of cant."

GREENE: Krauthammer had been battling cancer, and he wrote in The Washington Post this month, quote, "I leave this life with no regrets. It was a wonderful life, full and complete, with the great loves and great endeavors that make it worth living."

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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