Christopher Hitchens- A Powerful Voice for Atheism: Dead at 62

Hitchens had been battling cancer for some time but it did come as a shock when I read the news that he had died.
He was one of the most intelligent and relentless critics of religion of recent memory. He had a way of destroying the arguments of the religious with a ruthless glee that made his supporters cheer and his critics howl. He was one of the main voices I listened to when I was still new to Atheism. I never knew the man, like many of his supporters I would have liked to, but also like many of his supporters I felt I knew him in a sense from his writing and his famous debates his religious opponents.
I am certain his book God is Not Great will be read for many years to come and admired and scorned as an unapologetic, take-no-prisoners argument against all religion and superstition.
Hitchens was also noted for being a steadfast supporter of the Iraq War, a position which drew criticism and sometimes contempt from the Left. But Hitchens himself never really left the Left, he may have softened from the days when he called himself a Socialist but he was never a conservative.
Even though I am firmly a creature of the Right I will miss his razor-sharp intellect and his give-'em-hell approach to taking on religion.