Pirro had some strong hype early on but has consistently come across as a lightweight. You are correct.
Freepers should remember that our leaders lead, and do not rule. Most NYers aren't all that conservative. Running a strong conservative to alienate them out of spite is just plain dumb. The leader should best reflect the values of NYers. Running a candidate who clearly does not relect the values of most NYers is a formula for consistent losses.
As for giving people a clear choice, look at IL. Keyes was squashed like a bug, though he gave voters a clear choice. He was strongly rejected by the electorate.
"The leader should best reflect the values of NYers. Running a candidate who clearly does not relect the values of most NYers is a formula for consistent losses."
That's a talking point of self styled centrists, but is such a position honest, or effective?
In a two-party system, you don't aim for the middle of the electorate, as it will alienate the base, and drive them away over time. What is more effective is building a coalition of various types of voters, advocating their positions in some sort of consistent way across a single party line, and aim for the middle of your side. Undecideds, though they will decide elections if only half the population shows up to vote, are not the people you build a campaign around. They may be representive of the average guy, but there is an obligation to server your party's voice.
I can see the communist party of China, in the instances where they bother to consider the average Chinaman on the street, to make such an everyday guy calculation. That's because it'a a one Party system. In America, it's a battle, and someone has to win, and someone has to lose, it's not win-win come election time.
"Keyes was squashed like a bug, though he gave voters a clear choice."
Jack Ryan, pre-scandal, also would have given people in IL a clear choice. He also would have done better than Keyes, in that he wasn't flown in out of state at the last minute, so to speak.
Keyes was never considered a serious candidate, because he was used BY the IL RINO establishment in an effort to try to discredit Conservative candidates. He received no money, no ACTUAL party support. His mistake was in graciously accepting the nod from those racist RINO cowards who disdained him personally and everything he stood for. As for any debates he held with Obama, the Stepinfetchit for his Massa Byrd in West Vuhginny, he wiped the floor with him. Probably one of the very few instances in the history of American politics when a candidate was better than those he sought to represent.