I was reading the We Need a Pelosi In the Senate thread, and I was astounded at what I thought was a glaring omission from the suggestions of my fellow dKos bloggers.
Just to review, lets see what we came up with as qualities that would be good for a new Majority/Minority leader: tough as nails, able to represent the party's positions faithfully, good communicator and, most importantly (thanks for pointing this out, KevinA), not too beholden to any specific interests.
I was thinking through this and realized that we were forgetting a fairly obvious candidate: Jon Corzine of New Jersey.
He has his problems. He is former Wall Street, and he isn't exactly the poster child for campaign finance reform. However, he self-finances his campaigns, for the most part, therefore he is not beholden to too many. He's tough, and he is able to represent our ideals faithfully.
Just a thought.