NY1 News is reporting that Governor Pataki won’t challenge Hillary Clinton for Senate next year.

He’s not utterly Shermanesque in this exchange, but pretty close:

Pataki: I do not want to be a United States Senator. I have a job that I am very proud to have and very grateful to the people of New York because they’ve given me this tremendous honor of being their governor.

Carter: So you’re stating for the record tonight that you will not run for U.S. Senate?

Pataki: I certainly have no expectation that I will run for the Senate in 2006 and 2008, or any time thereafter.

Now the field of credible challengers is down to an increasingly unlikely one.