Lowering standards? Lowering them to what? ryan256 photo for example, that girl is a solid 8. She is not one of the uglies and she is in shape. I'd go out with her any day of the week and feel good about it.
The saddest thing is, as Insomniator has said, most of the girls would be very beautiful if they were not overweight. That extra 50-100 pounds can dramatically change the way the person looks. Even the OP's wife, looking at her picture I bet she is overweight to some degree. However, she does have really cute face and those eyes... If she got in shape, I would also bet she would look stunningly beautiful.
That's the crux of the issue IMO. In my experience, it is extremely rare that you see unattractive in shape girl. Unless they have some sort of disfigurment such as bad teeth or extremely large forehead, they all look good to me. They may range on a scale, but they are all at least 7+. However, as soon as they start gaining weight, they all automatically go below 5. It's just not fun dating a fatty.
Now, I'm not a hunk of athletic guy here, but I have been getting in shape for the last year. I've started running again, I've slimmed down to the point where I think it's about time to start bulking up, I bike 30-40 miles on Fridays. The more I do it, the more I realize I like it. I want to be in shape so that I can feel great and do awesome stuff. And at the same time I realized that I've simply became incompatible with fatties because they are simply not into the same things as I am. It's simply a different lifestyle. Whereas I would go biking, a fatty would rather stay at home, watch some sitcom and munch on chips. I went indoor rock climbing yesterday for the first time and I loved it, I'll definitely be coming back for more. However, as I was there for about 2 hours, I only noticed 4 overweight people, and 3 of those were parents who were taking their kids climbing. What does this tell me? It tells me fatties do not like doing athletic stuff, they do not like rock climbing, they do not like hiking, they do not like biking, they do not like playing sports. In a way it's logical, because if they did like all those things, they wouldn't be overweight in the first place. But the point is it's not just looks, it's also lifestyle.
So what's the point of me saying this? I guess I don't really understand the OP, or maybe what he says doesn't apply to me. In my opinion almost every in shape girl is dateable, so there is really no lowering standard possible here. If I lowered them, I'd be dating fatties, but to be honest, I'd rather stay single than date one of them because I know we are going to be incompatible.