“O’Donnell is far more impressive than given credit for, and it literally would have been a disaster to nominate Castle....”
You are right about Castle, but it was equally disastrous to nominate O’Donnell. People like her have issues that are important to them that are not important to the electorate, and in some cases those “personal issues” are counterproductive to being elected (Can you say Todd Akin)? While religion was an issue for Romney, he tried not to make it so which is more than can be said for the failed candidates that have been mentioned in this thread.
I would only quibble around the edges with you on this- that being the fact that many of O’Donnells personal problems were merely the typical “life is tough” stuff that we all go thru. Life is easy on the goverrnment dole, and that includes elected officials and government bureaucrats. The rest of us have to face the real world, and its not always easy.