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| English: Official photo of David Petraeus, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Petraeus resigned from the CIA Friday after admitting to an extramarital affair with Paula Broadwell, who authored a biography of him titled "All In". Both are married, but to other people. Reportedly, the relationship had been going on for the past several months.
Then it was learned that a friend of the Petraeuses, Jill Kelley, had allegedly been getting anonymous e-mails warning her against flirting with the retired general. The FBI later traced them to Broadwell.
Drawn into this is General John Allen, who succeeded Petraeus as commander of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan, and is in line to head NATO in Europe. Allen is being investigated by the FBI for exchanging at least 20,000 e-mails with Kelley. Again, both are married, but to other people.
The whole thing smacks of curious timing. Petraeus' resignation came days after President Barack Obama's re-election, and days before a Congressional probe into the deaths of a U.S. ambassador and others in Benghazi, Libya. Petraeus was supposed to testify, but now that will be handled by acting CIA director Michael Morell.
No national security was breached, so far as we are allowed to know (this being the CIA). Still, Petraeus did the only thing he could do in resigning. It's one thing to cheat on your wife of 38 years. It's quite another to betray your country, especially when you're in charge of its secrets.
There will be more to come, we're sure. There's nothing like a juicy sex scandal to take people's minds off what's really important. Such as the so-called "fiscal cliff" that threatens to send the country into another recession, unless the President and Congress somehow comes up with a budget deal by the time the ball drops on Times Square New Year's Eve.
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