Some thoughts,
1. Do we have any idea what he thinks about any domestic policy matter?
2. The norms of campaigns have developed in such a way that national candidates have to comment on a wide variety of issues and have a finely tuned sense of the dynamics of national-level popular and media opinion related not only to a given issue position (and how that position is explained), but how the various issue positions interact with each other and do so at a high level of scrutiny. National candidates who don’t master this (Wesley Clark and Rick Perry) get in trouble very fast. From everything I’ve read, Petraeus has the energy and intelligence to master this given time and respect for the challenge. But I don’t know that several weeks is enough time and there will inevitably be a learning curve. For these purposes, it isn’t 1952 and, even if it were, Petraeus doesn’t have the national profile of Eisenhower.
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