Petraeus’ Indifference Problem
Peter Beinart has a pretty clever column about how it would be good if David Petraeus ran for President as a Republican in 2012. It’s clever in the sense that he uses the conceit to make various smart points. But the conceit itself is dumb. Alex Massie makes some good points about this. But the larger issue is that there’s no evidence that the public cares at all about Petraeus’ signature issues. Stroll over to Polling Report’s problems and priorities page. A recent CBS News poll indicates that . . . nobody cares:
If you expand the choice set offered to people, you get somewhat different answers. For example, an August CNN/Opinion Research poll let people say “education” and it turns out that just as many people think this is the most important issue as think Iraq and Afghanistan is:
As it happens, former Bush administration Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings is, like David Petraeus, an example of a Bush administration official who you can find Democrats who’ll praise. But I don’t see anyone touting her as a likely presidential contender. Because, you know, she was a second-tier cabinet member working on a second-tier issue.
34 Responses to “Petraeus’ Indifference Problem”
Register
RSSLogin
Topic Cloud
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
October 14th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Compelling figures and political strategies can change what the public thinks is important. In 2012, the economy will presumably be a lot better and health care reform will have passed.
Also, my anecdotal experience canvassing for Kerry in Nevada for a few days in 2004 makes me think that some conservative Democrats feel war / national security to be important in their gut to a much greater extent than you’d think from what they say to pollsters. A lot of people (Democrats and “gettable” independents) who had voted for Bush in 2000 or who said they were likely to vote for Bush in 2004 also said that something like health care or education or the economy was the most important issue to them, and then when I followed up with a question about how they preferred Bush on those issues, I got a lot of responses relating to Iraq and terrorism.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Couldn’t Petreaus just be moderate to liberal on domestic issues, while using GOP deification to secure the right?
October 14th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Using the idiotic definition provided by Yglesias about what constitutes an administration official, doesn’t that now make Petraeus an Obama administration official?
Anyone with a brain, which leaves out leftists, will know that a 4-star general is not the same as any other administration official. Also, anyone with a brain, which again leaves out leftists, knows that Americans love good American generals. Unless the general comes out with really dumb policy statements (Wesley Clark) or dumb statements in general (Colin Powell) if and when they venture into the political realm, Americans will usually give plenty of deference to whatever policy is being espoused by a former general running for office.
It’s the reality. Not the idiocy mentioned in the post.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Because it’s not about issues. If the Republicans were able to recruit Petraeus, they’d likely have a more formidable candidate than anybody else who is lined up for 2012. That, of course, may change when he opens his mouth, but for now, he’s got enough star power to appeal to the mainstream, and the fringies don’t despise him. He wouldn’t need to spend his campaign talking about Afghanistan or military tactics. Instead, he can just offer bromides about strength and toughness. That would probably get him farther than Mitt Romney, at least.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Wow, we really have privatized warfare.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:40 pm
And besides, did you see all the fruit salad on his chest at the hearings? Wingnuts just love that stuff.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
Actually, can you tell me the last General elected president? Eisenhower, who was a great man, and whose influence managed to keep the GOP in the “sane” zone for almost twenty years after he left office.
American history since the start of the Civil war is replete with generals who thought they should be president, but couldn’t get the public to agree. McClellan. MacArthur. Wesley Clark.
I leave out Colin Powell because I am not convinced he ever coveted the job.
If you are going to call people names, sonny, you should occassionally do your homework.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
This underestimates Gen Petraeus, who in my opinion is an
extremely dangerous man and a very possible candidate.
Why ?
1) He has extraordinarily good relationships with the press.
For many years the MSM has used Petraeus as a source, has
gone along with whatever he wanted them to say, and has
never published anything remotely critical of him.
2) He’s intelligent.
3) He’s hard-working. You don’t get to rise that high that
quickly in the military without being able to work hard.
So maybe he doesn’t know much about economic policy: but
as an intelligent and well-connected guy accustomed to
working 100-hour weeks, he can get someone to brief him
and he’ll learn damn quickly. And besides, what you can
learn in a couple of days is enough to be way better-
informed than most of the Republican leadership.
4) He’s free of scandals. Most Republican bigwigs came up
either through business or through state politics, and
in either of those fields they’re likely to have some
financial, legal, or marital skeletons in their closets.
In contrast, soldiers have to keep their noses pretty
damn clean to get ahead.
5) He’s ambitious. It’s not an accident that people are
talking about Petraeus as a possible candidate: it’s
people in Petraeus’ camp floating a trial balloon.
6) He has favors to cash in. Remember his OpEd shortly
before the 2004 election describing how well everything
was going in Iraq ? The Republican establishment owes
him for that one, and you better believe he’s going to
cash it in.
I loathe the guy. But he’s running, and he’s dangerous.
October 14th, 2009 at 12:53 pm
I wrote this before, but why do we assume that Petraeus is a Republican??
October 14th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
I would argue that Petraeus is more like MacArthur than Eisenhower. Frankly, to date, he appears to be a competent, highly ambitious guy with an interesting combination of virtues and amorality, but his success to date is a one-trick pony. How are things proceeding in Afghanistan and Iraq?
If that is the case, a Petraeus presidency might be unfortunate, whereas, personally, I think we could use another Eisenhower.
The one consolation is that, within the last 150 years, the public has not been overly prone to electing generals.
October 14th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
why do we assume that Petraeus is a Republican?
Because the Republicans are looking for a candidate in 2012, while the Democrats already have one.
October 14th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Huh? This post makes no sense at all. The public doesn’t elect people with a specific intention to work on matters relating to their background. Al Franken wasn’t elected because people worried about the state of comedy. Rush Holt wasn’t elected because science was the most important issue in the country. Barack Obama wasn’t elected because there is a crisis in community organizing.
Petraeus’s background is important because is gives him fame and it gives him general credibility on all issues.
October 14th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
If generals were really as much of a shoe-in as people like Stevie say, we’d see a lot more of them run and win. And yet, here we are…
October 14th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
It’s hard to imagine Petraeus surviving a modern Republican primary without ruining his public image, but maybe the base would respect such a strong candidate without forcing him to swear fealty to the suicide pact which is the Republican agenda.
October 14th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
I wonder whether Petraeus may have already gone past his “Best used by” date. I know the Villagers are still in love but I wonder about the country at large particularly now that he is not directly in charge of either country.
I mean I suppose I could rack my brain and remember who Petraeus’s boss was when Petraeus was directly in charge of Iraq but it doesn’t pop right to mind. If you are a voter that is reasonably up on current events you can count on reading or seeing the name ‘Ray Odierno’ in or on the news pretty regularly and ‘McChrystal’ even more so, but outside pieces like this how often do you see ‘Petraeus’. There was a story directly addressing this, saying that Petraeus was deliberately keeping a low profile because that is what his chain of command, including Obama, wanted him to do. On the other hand that might well bring about the desired political result, that by 2012 or 2016 that ‘Petraeus’ has no more resonance than ‘Ricardo Sanchez’ as memories of the Surge fade and Iraq still remains a place of recurrent violence. Plus if Kirkuk blows its top nobody will remember the ‘victory’ of late 2007.
As to the medals. Every four-star has a chest full of medals, they are called ‘fruit salad’ for a reason, only a handful of them have real significance and few people outside the military could pick those out at by sight. Most of the rest of them are campaign ribbons and unit citations mostly earned just by being there in country or as a unit member.
October 14th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
“his success to date is a one-trick pony”
His success to date is getting the press to write whatever
he wants them to write. Iraq is still a mess. Afghanistan
is always going to be a mess. But if you can dictate what
the press writes and what becomes the conventional wisdom,
then you’re a formidable candidate whether or not you’ve
actually achieved anything.
That’s pretty much how we got McCain 2008 – a darling of the
media, with no real accomplishments to his name. And but for
the economic crash and Palin’s spectacular fail, he would
have run a close race. Petraeus has the same positives,
without the negatives of the S&L financial scandal, an ugly
divorce, a wife who narrowly escaped jail for stealing drugs,
a fabulously inept campaign, and an unstable temperament.
I think Petraeus is too smart to go up against the Obama
juggernaut in 2012, but I reckon he runs in 2016, by which
time the Republican establishment will be desperate enough
that they may be prepared to tone down the racism and
religiosity and just run on militarism and tax cuts, a
combination that is incoherent but disturbingly popular in
the USA.
October 14th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Clearly Petraeus needs to go to the American Enterprise Institute and make a speech about the importance of cutting the deficit.
October 14th, 2009 at 2:30 pm
she was a second-tier cabinet member working on a second-tier issue
Is education really a second-tier issue?
Look at the difference in “Education” and “Other” between August 28 and October 5 (when education wasn’t one of the choices). What am I missing?
October 14th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
Education is very important to people, but it’s perceived as a local issue, not a national one. It’s a problem for the municipal school board and the state legislature, not the President of the United States.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Tim Connor:
I call lefty’s like Yglesias names because they deserve to be called names. Rude ones at that. It’s not that I care about contributing to the debate, because leftists don’t debate, nor care to debate, with anyone other than themselves.
My point was to show how utterly stupid Yglesias’ argument was when he was referring to Petraeus as just another Bush administration official. That was just dumb.
Here’s a list of Civil War generals who ended up being President: Grant, Hayes, and B. Harrison. So that’s three generals who ended up being President since the end of the Civil War, not just Eisenhower.
Like I said, Americans like good generals, and don’t have a problem electing them President unless they say something that isn’t so bright or the policies those ex-generals support suck (McClellan and Clark; I don’t include MacArthur, who would have ended up running against Ike in 1952 if he had really wanted to be President; I don’t think MacArthur ever tried to make a serious run for the office after that).
October 14th, 2009 at 3:52 pm
This is an odd point. It’s not like Obama had any signature issues. Romney has some, but they’re ones that GOP voters don’t like (same with McCain). Palin and Huckabeee don’t exactly have any signature issues unless you count being really pro-life. I actually don’t think people win nominations and presidencies on signature issues…..unless the signature issue happens to be military service! Then you tend to do well in U.S. presidential elections.
Petraeus could destroy anyone in the GOP field, if he turns out to be a moderately disciplined candidate. He’ll have to dial up the crazy at some point in order to please the Tea Party folks, but maybe he could get around that through the sheer adoration that Glenn Beck has for him. Romney and Palin should get a clue and realize that if they don’t run in 2012, there will be no chance for them.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
I wrote this before, but why do we assume that Petraeus is a Republican??
Because he is registered as a Republican?
October 14th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
There’s no village idiot quite like the one who thinks he’s the village historian.
The big rotten red herring in SteveAR’s screed, leaving aside for a moment his dubious claim to speak on behalf of “Americans” against the majority of actual Americans, is the notion that someone can make grand claims about what Americans “like” or “give plenty of deference to” based on a set of examples that end in 1956, a year during which the overwhelming majority of contemporary Americans were either unborn or well below the age of 21. The country has changed dramatically since then.
The military is a highly respected institution, but only a very small number of post-world war 2 generals have developed the sort of celebrity persona that is now essential to advancing in national politics, and fewer still have been broadly popular and respected for their judgment on any matters other than national defense. Since Ike and MacArthur left the limelight, I’d say that’s probably a list of one: Colin Powell.
It’s not entirely inconceivable that Petraeus, who is highly respected in certain influential circles, could build a candidacy. But he is not especially well-known outside of political junkie circles, led in a war that is broadly unpopular, and is facing an electorate that, for the time being, is focused on domestic politics and economics. The idea that Americans will defer to his judgment on health care or instinctively rally around the flag to support him in 2012 is, frankly, idiotic.
If Petraeus wants to be President, he’ll have to set up camp in Iowa and New Hampshire and completely reinvent himself as a politician. His mostly respected resume as a General will get his foot in the door, and he’s by all accounts a very smart guy, but he’s got massive amounts of work to do if he even wants to compete with the likes of Mitt Romney, let alone be a “formidable” challenger to Obama.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Take it up with your wingnut brethren, Steve AR. It wasn’t Matt Y who decided that David Patraeus was a wingnut holy man, and wanted the Republicans to make him their standard bearer.
Idiocy? Oh, absolutely – but idiocy from your lot. It doesn’t make Matt complicit in the idiocy that he’s pointing and laughing at it.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
“the sort of celebrity persona that is now essential to advancing in national politics, and fewer still have been broadly popular and respected for their judgment on any matters other than national defense”
Oh sure, he’s not a great candidate. But he doesn’t have to be
great to win the Republican nomination: he just has to be better
than the alternatives. And since a whole generation of
up-and-coming Republicans have been thoroughly discredited by
their association with the Bush administration and its failed
policies, e.g. Ridge, Powell, Santorum, Allen etc, the field
is really weak. If this were Petraeus against Bob Dole in
1996, he’d have no chance. But Petraeus vs Huckabee ?
Petraeus vs Romney ? Petraeus vs Gingrich ? Petraeus vs
Jindal ? Petraeus vs McConnell ? Really, who have they
got ? Who has an R against their name and is “respected
for their judgment” ?
Heck, certainly not Palin! But she got the VP nomination.
That’s how thin the field is after 8 years of Bush.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:45 pm
ga73:
Did you read Sully today? It answers your question.
October 14th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
joe from Lowell:
I realize the pea-sized brain of leftists makes what I said hard to understand, but my point there had nothing to do with Petraeus being considered a candidate for President. What’s really interesting is how you think Yglesias isn’t trying to tie Petraeus to Bush despite the fact that Petraeus now works for Obama. That happened on Jan. 20 of this year, in case you missed it. So either you’re an exceptionally idiotic moonbat, or you’re lying about what Yglesias said; I wouldn’t discount either. I know what Yglesias said. It was pathetic, and pathetically stupid.
October 14th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Yeah, Ike got elected, but then again we won WW2,
Grant, Hayes et al, we won the civil war too
Pretaus?
Well if you think that the majority of Americans view Iraq as a glorious victory then by all means, run him
October 14th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
Setting aside comments about Powell and Clark, surely it *is* idiotic to trust a priori policy claims made by former generals.
Unless the general comes out with really dumb policy statements (Wesley Clark) or dumb statements in general (Colin Powell) if and when they venture into the political realm, Americans will usually give plenty of deference to whatever policy is being espoused by a former general running for office.
It’s the reality. Not the idiocy mentioned in the post.
October 14th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
”Like I said, Americans like good generals, and don’t have a problem electing them President unless they say something that isn’t so bright or the policies those ex-generals support suck”
So… American like military men in office, unless they don’t agree with the far right, then they don’t like them
Must be why McCain crushed Obama last November
PS
Remember President LeMay? Good times, good times
October 14th, 2009 at 9:48 pm
“I actually don’t think people win nominations and presidencies on signature issues…..unless the signature issue happens to be military service!”
I’d say even INCLUDING military service. It might’ve pushed Kerry and McCain through incredibly weak primary fields, but it sure didn’t help them in the general. It didn’t even get Wes Clark THAT far. I can’t really think of anyone else who put the military at the center of their campaign that much. Even Ike ran on other issues (if you check his ads at the time, most of them are directed at consumer issues and economics, not national security).
October 14th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
I’ll try to put this in very small words, because I know you’re a Bush voter:
Matt isn’t “trying” to tie Patraeus to the Bush administration. You wankers are doing that, have done that, and some of you want to keep doing that, all the way to the White House.
Matt isn’t making that up. He’s describing it. A whole lot of you toothless hillbilly types have decided that David Patraeus is…how can I put this so you might understand it?…he’s like Jeebus to George Bush’s God. All of the “Elect Patreaus” noise is based on the idea that George Bush’s Iraq War was awesome, and David Patraeus was Bush’s best friend and truest believer. You, Bubba, your wife/sister, and the tiny fringe of people like you have made Patraeus a possible presidential figure purely based on your belief that he’d be the restoration of the Bush Era. You see him as the man who shares Bush’s brain, his soul mate, and wish to elect him wholly based on his purported ability and desire to pick up where Bush left off, and continue to push his discredited, lunatic neoconservative global jihad.
I don’t know that David Patraeus even agrees with your silly-assed, blood-stained, imperialist policy of endless war, but many of you do believe that, and it is precisely that belief – in the idea of Patraeus as the ultimate Bush guy, who will continue Bush’s agenda – that leads you to look at him as a potential Republican nominee for president.
Matt isn’t making that up. You can write another vapid, insult-laden screed if you want, but it won’t change the simple fact that Patraeus was taken in hand by the Bush administration, promoted, listened to, and adopted as their poster boy. The Bush administration took David Patraeus, and made him a national figure of major political import. Not only was he a prominent Bush administration official, but it is precisely his status as a Bush administration official, and the closeness this implies with Bush’s political beliefs, that is behind this talk about running him for president.
The fact that his tour in the post to which the Bush administration appointed him extends into Obama’s first term doesn’t really change either of these points – that it was the Bush administration that made him a nationally-prominent figure, and that it is this connection with Bush and the events of his presidency that makes him an attractive presidential candidate among your sort of backwoods-American.
October 14th, 2009 at 11:27 pm
Of course, you’ve started to pick up on the fact that, among most of us in America, George Bush’s reputation is lower than whale poop, so even as you pin up the Patraeus poster over your bed – surge me, David, surge me – you understand that need to paper over the very connection to Bush that makes you lust after him so.
George who? Never heard of him. Isn’t David Patraeus some sort of Obama appointee? I think he was a community organizer.
Good luck with that.
October 15th, 2009 at 11:02 am
joe from Lowell:
Bullshit, you liar.
What is it, have you been a leftist so long that it is ingrained into your system to lie about what English words mean? Let’s review:
Yglesias calls Petraeus a Bush administration official. Read the words. And stop lying about what those words mean.