Breaking: The extraordinary life of conservative icon Charles Krauthammer has come to an end

Charles Krauthammer, the intellectual giant of conservatism, lost his fight with cancer Thursday at the age of 68.

'Say it honestly and bluntly.'

Krauthammer had announced on June 8 that he had only weeks to live after a diagnosis of a recurrence of abdominal cancer.

He became a cable news "mega-star" despite being confined to a wheelchair after a tragic accident in college that left him a quadriplegic.

"You're betraying your whole life if you don't say what you think and you don't say it honestly and bluntly," Krauthammer said once.

'The sheer force of his intellect'

"This is not a man designed for television," said Fox News colleague Brit Hume. "You look at him and say this is not a potential TV star. In fact, he became a huge star, even I'd almost say a mega-star on this channel. And it was from the sheer force of his intellect and the power of his thinking."

"And on top of that there was a gentleness about him, just personally," he added. "You know if you he disagreed with you, you never felt attacked, you know, he just disagreed with you."

"R.I.P. good friend," said Fox News colleague Bret Baier. "I am sure you will be owning the panel discussion in heaven as well."

"And we’ll make sure your wise words and thoughts — your legacy — will live on here," he added.

Krauthammer was a big major league baseball fan, and loved the Washington Nationals. The baseball club tweeted on the occasion of his death.

"He was loved and admired by many and will be truly missed here at Nationals Park," they tweeted.

'I lived the life that I intended.'

“I leave this life with no regrets,” Krauthammer said in his last public statement. “It was a wonderful life — full and complete with the great loves and great endeavors that make it worth living."

"I am sad to leave," he concluded, "but I leave with the knowledge that I lived the life that I intended.”

Here's a video remembrance of Krauthammer's life from Bret Baier: