reliably conservative. he voted with the gop 87% of the time. compared to 60% of the time for susan collins. he got a conservative union score of 81 points, he was an unapologetic western conservative. anti-abortion, progun rights, a hawk on foreign affairs, but he broke with the g.o.p. in key areas that some activists see as unforgivable. a campaign finance reform law bill, climate change, bush tax cuts in 2001, and he denounced terrorist interrogation techniques that he called