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Home Front: Politix
Petraeus: No Interest in Presidency
2007-12-24
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush's top Iraq war commander said Sunday that as far as he knows, his command performances now and in the future will be strictly military, not political. In fact, Army Gen. David Petraeus cited the words of Civil War-era Gen. William T. Sherman in declaring he has no interest in shedding his uniform and running for the White House, as Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower did 55 years ago.

``None,'' Petraeus replied, when asked on ``Fox News Sunday'' if he had an interest in running. ``I have great respect for those who do choose to serve our country in that way. I've chosen to serve our country in uniform,'' Petraeus said from Baghdad.

``And I think that General Sherman had it right when he gave what is now commonly referred to as a Shermanesque response when asked a similar question.''

A leading Union general in the war, Sherman said in a telegram to the Republican National Convention in 1884, when he was being urged to run for president, ``I will not accept if nominated, and I will not serve if elected,'' according to ``The Yale Book of Quotations.''
Posted by:Steve White

#5  That was now, this is then.
Posted by: KBK   2007-12-24 22:50  

#4  The President is the Commander in Chief. Petraeus' point was that the President is more than the Commander in Chief, and he's not built that way.

I respect that.
Posted by: Ptah   2007-12-24 22:16  

#3  Maybe we can make the Presidency into a Generalship for 4 years to accommodate Gen. Petraeus.
Posted by: Alaska Paul   2007-12-24 15:11  

#2  And remember Ike didn't want the job either. Sherman was approached by members of what we'd call the Party Machine, not the people. Ike was asked by the people.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2007-12-24 08:26  

#1  Would that he follow the footpath of another great American general, and if offered, accept the Presidency of Washington and Lee University in Lexington. Our Old Dominion young people need him. Washington is lost.
Posted by: Besoeker   2007-12-24 00:57  

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