Liberal New York Times: Orrin Hatch is Too Liberal for Utah

To those who say Orrin Hatch is "conservative enough," here's a little reminder. This is from Nate Silver (not a conservative) at the New York Times (not a conservative publication):

...the dashed line represents how conservative we would expect a Republican senator to be, based on the partisan composition of her state. The further below the dashed line that the senator appears, the more liberal he or she is, relative to the state. Those far below the line, from a Republican point of view, are arguably not pulling their weight.

Five Republicans stand out as being especially far below the line — that is, they are more liberal than you would typically expect a Republican from their state to be. The list includes George V. Voinovich of Ohio, who is retiring, and Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, along with Mr. Hatch. And, sure enough, we also see Ms. Murkowski and Mr. Bennett.

Details on the numbers are here.

Silver wrote what I quoted above back in September of 2010.

Subsequently, conservitive Mike Lee (R) displaced liberal Republican Bob Bennett and liberal George Voinovich (R) retired and made way for conservative Rob Portman (R). Liberal Republican Olympia Snowe is retiring this year. Liberal Lisa Murkowski lost the GOP primary in 2010 to a conservative (but with the help and encouragement of -- drum roll --- liberal Republican Orrin Hatch, she went on to win in the general election as a write-in candidate ).

Now Richard Lugar is in trouble (update, 5.8.12: he's out) and Orrin Hatch is feeling the heat.

Hatch will now face a June 26 primary election against a conservative -- state Sen. Dan Liljenquist.

I leave you with a quote:

"What do you call a Senator who's served in office for 18 years? You call him home."

— Orrin Hatch, 1976 (Orrin has been in the U.S. Senate now for 36 years.)