A welcome distraction

Giuliano D. writes:

L’Affaire Petraeus is such a welcome distraction from the serious analysis, facts, and figures, and civilizational speculation concerning the election. Keep the photos coming. Ah, what a relief!

Mark Jaws writes:

I think Senore Giulano is being sarcastic.

Giuliano D. replies:

LOL.

LA replies:

You haven’t said whether Mark is right or not.

Giuliano D. replies:

Mark is partially right. I’m not being sarcastic, but there is a tinge of irony. Over the past few weeks I did quite a lot of reading concerning the election. I became fascinated with the methodology, the mathematics, the data and statistics of polling. One of the posts I sent you before the election talked about which polls would be validated by the election. I don’t ever recall in my life being so intently involved in such an intense, continuous, “scientific” description and analysis of an electorate. Access to this type of information was overwhelming.

When the Petraeus affair hit, it was a moment of absurdity. It was a relief to get away from the scientific, empirical world of data to witness human folly. Just the sheer incongruence of a Paula Broadwell with a David Petraeus triggered off by a Jill Kelley (though I like her given name Gilberte Khawam better). I couldn’t help smiling for days. It was like passing a rigorous examination and then blowing off steam the day after.

However I never took Petraeus seriously as other people did. Excerpts from his Princeton Ph.D thesis have been printed in which he stated that to combat terrorism one has to get involved in building a country’s infrastructure (housing, electricity, water distribution, etc.). From military tactics to social policy at the expense of the taxpayer? Why his thesis is considered brilliant military strategy and has not been publicly challenged is beyond me because it has become the blueprint for Afghanistan. I considered the man intellectually shallow and I think the present scandal affair confirms this. As Elaine said to Jerry, with finger in the air, “Fake! Fake! Fake!”

Posted by Lawrence Auster at November 14, 2012 12:31 PM | Send