His personal life had very little (if anything) to do with "Rudy fatigue." Let's look at the context, a tough-nosed and fiscal conservative mayor in liberal NYC. Not the suburbs, liberal NYC. When faced with a crime crisis the libs were happy to bring in a law and order salvation, but once the problem was solved then many of them were going back to their old ways, wanting someone to pursue more liberal agendas. Plus when times are good people have a natural inclination to start taking things for granted and getting restless for change. The same way the UK dumped Churchill after WWII and the US gave Bush 41 sky-high ratings after the Gulf War but then voted him out soon after.
I was in north Jersey when he was running for Senate, and he was in the lead before he dropped out. If he had a 40% approval in NYC in 8/01 (and remember that was a prety much a low ebb in the ups and downs, GOP approval ratings always go up as elections near and voters are faced with just 2 choices) then it means he would easily win statewide or nationally, given how liberal NYC is. Virtually all of those with "Rudy fatigue" felt that he was too conservative, not too liberal.
Oh, I agree. The left felt that he had too many "scandals", mostly involving the police.
Doesn't change the fact that before 9/11 he would not have been re-elected mayor, even if eligible.
Correct. Back then, the biggest critics of Giuliani were Al Sharpton and the NY Times.
I don't think this was the case at all. I seem to remember that his poll numbers were surprisingly low in that hypothetical Senate match-up.