WASHINGTON _ Former Rep. Steve LaTourette, a moderate Republican who surprised the GOP by retiring in 2012 in protest of what he termed the "dumbing down" of the party, died on Tuesday of pancreatic cancer, according to media reports. He was 62.
LaTourette, an Ohio defense attorney with a professorial beard and an irreverent wit, came to Congress in 1994 amid a wave that gave the Republican Party control of the both houses of Congress for the first time in 40 years. After his departure, he led an offensive against the tea party and other conservative groups, predicting that their refusal to compromise would destroy the GOP.
"There are people on the right and the left who think that if you compromise you're a coward, you're a facilitator, you're an appeaser," LaTourette said at a 2012 press conference explaining his decision to retire. From the sidelines, his denouncements became more forceful. He famously termed GOP hardliners "the chuckleheads" and said the job of a lawmaker "sucks."
