Dr. Fletcher proved to be a real political failure; he had a great opportunity. I don’t know exactly what happened. He probably lost in 2007 because of his strong pro-life views.
His pro-life views had nothing to do with it. When the Democrats put up legislative thug Greg Stumbo for Attorney General and won in 2003 downballot from Fletcher, he launched an all-out war to take down Fletcher at any cost. Since Fletcher was the first GOP Governor in the state in 4 decades (an abomination in and of itself), he sought to put his own stamp on the state and start removing the permanent Democrat political class of state workers partly responsible for the perpetuity of the party in Frankfort (even as the state was now federally Republican).
Stumbo honed in on that as a high criminal activity (oh, noes, Republicans replacing Democrat hacks !) and with the help of the leftist media, spent virtually his entire term making Fletcher out to be a crook trying to line the state with hacks (nevermind the GOP was virtually shut out). It seriously damaged Fletcher (and Mitch McConnell panicked and put up ex-Congresswoman Anne Northup in the ‘07 primary, which only served to drain Fletcher’s resources).
The KY GOP should’ve directed all its resources to protecting Fletcher and zeroing in on Stumbo, the real corrupt farce, but failed to do so. A damaged Fletcher ends up losing to Beshear, making his 2-decade long comeback after having been knocked out of the line of succession in 1987 by Wallace Wilkinson. Stumbo, not running for reelection as Attorney General (for obvious reasons) instead returns to the legislature as a conquering hero and he is rewarded with the position of House Speaker.
Beshear resumes the business-as-usual practice of placing the same Democrat hacks infesting Frankfort for time immemorial and nary a peep is heard from the media (where it is apparently only unethical or illegal if a Republican does it). The Frankfort Way.