The Legend of David Petraeus

[xchrom]

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/national-affairs/the-legend-of-david-petraeus-20120131

The genius of David Petraeus has always been his masterful manipulation of the media. But after reading the new biography about him – All In: The Education of David Petraeus, by former Army officer Paula Broadwell – I’ve started to wonder if he’s losing his touch. The best spinsters never make their handiwork too obvious; they allow all parties to retain a semblance of dignity. Yet the Petraeus-approved All In is such blatant, unabashed propaganda, it’s as if the general has given up pretending there’s a difference between the press and his own public relations team. As Gen. John Galvin, an early mentor, explains to a young David in one of the book’s few revealing moments, "Through your mythology people create you…. You become part of the legend." All In is best understood as the latest – and least artful – contribution to the Petraeus legend.

***snip

The result is a work of fan fiction so fawning that not even Max Boot – a Petraeus buddy and Pentagon sock puppet – could bring himself to rave about it, grouching in The Wall Street Journal about All In’s "lack of independent perspective" and the authors' tendency to skirt conflict. (Boot, the hackiest of the neocon hacks, is now an advisor to Mitt Romney.)

***snip

Well, Petraeus didn’t win in Afghanistan – unless one defines winning the Charlie Sheen sense of the word. Rather, he proposed and followed a counterinsurgency strategy that was expensive, bloody, and inconclusive. One could argue – many have, myself included – that Afghanistan is unwinnable in any meaningful sense, a colossal and futile waste of blood and treasure with only a tenuous connection to America’s national security interests. But that's an idea that doesn’t seem to occur to Broadwell. "History has yet to fully judge Petraeus’s service in Iraq and Afghanistan," she claims. Well, let me be the first to render a full judgment: Petraeus’s Afghan war was an epic fail.

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/national-affairs/the-legend-of-david-petraeus-20120131#ixzz1lEdOkJZk

[zipplewrath]

1. It really pisses me off

That a guy who ran on so much "change" and specifically change in our military strategy in our two wars, chose to keep this guy on, and in fact basically promote him. A major house cleaning was in order, especially before forming new policies in Afghanistan.

[bemildred]

2. Oh Good Lord. nt

[DCKit]

3. Time to add some tags to this book on Amazon.com. nt

Fantasy, Fiction, Propaganda....

[bemildred]

4. Drivel, babble, lickspittle, fool, ...