The Foundation

"We must take human nature as we find it, perfection falls not to the share of mortals." --George Washington

Opinion in Brief

2012-11-12-brief"David Petraeus's resignation [as CIA Director] marks the end of one of the great postwar military and government careers.... But for now, the explanation of Petraeus's resignation unfortunately raises more questions than it answers, in a number of significant ways: Fairly or not, questions will be raised why this Washington-style Friday-afternoon resignation occurred after rather than before the election -- a question that does not necessarily suggest that Petraeus did not take the proper nonpartisan course. But just days after [the election], we are already beginning to hear of all sorts of 'sudden' news: the Iranian attack on a U.S. drone; the plight of the Hurricane Sandy victims ... as much more severe than we were led to believe; the sudden publicity of the 'fiscal cliff'; and the Benghazi hearings. In that unfortunate politicized landscape comes the Petraeus bombshell. We were beginning to sense that the crime of Benghazi ... and the cover-up ... were not the entire story of the 9/11/2012 attack.... If rumors are true that the liaison may have involved biographer Paula Broadwell, co-author of an extremely favorable biography of Petraeus, then there are additional ethical issues that, fairly or not, call into question Broadwell's bona fides as an author and the portrait of Petraeus in her warmly received book. And if the FBI was involved, then additional questions arise over the reasons they also became interested -- when, why, how, and on whose prompt? Because of both Petraeus's sterling reputation and his high office, infidelity takes on greater importance than if it were -- how absurd to write this -- merely that of a lesser figure like Bill Clinton, whose serial miscreant conduct was taken for granted, even when he was a sitting president. If the affair occurred while Petraeus was general, it contradicted the code of military justice; if while at the CIA, it posed a potential security breach. For most of us, however, Petraeus is forever frozen as the hero of 2007-8, when, battered by the congressional hearings ... and ad hominem attack ads in the New York Times ... he nonetheless pressed ahead and broke the back of the insurgency -- in part due to his competence, his unmatched reputation, and the talented circle around him. ... [T]he truth was always that he sought to serve his country regardless of politics." --historian Victor Davis Hanson