Ben Smith: “There is a quiet and conventional path from shame to redemption for American political figures brought down by personal sins, and David Petraeus has, just six months after resigning as director of the CIA, followed it with his signature focus on strategy, and on his own image.”
“The former Iraq and Afghanistan commander, who resigned after an indiscreet extramarital affair, has mounted a two-pronged campaign on Washington, D.C. From the outside, he has chosen a safe and important charitable cause, the re-integration of veterans into American life. Meanwhile, on the inside, there are signs of just the right sort of Washington insurgency: Petraeus has not attempted the kind of brash, frontal, and unapologetic return former Rep. Anthony Weiner is trying in New York. Instead, he’s barely visible, working with the ubiquitous Beltway fixer Bob Barnett, though he has no book project or paid speaking tour in the works. He has been quietly, formally welcomed back to the town’s high society…”
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