3 years later, Democrats cast Petraeus in new light - Washington Times

3 years later, Democrats cast Petraeus in new light - Washington Times: "In less than three years, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus has risen from the brunt of ridicule by Democrats to President Obama's most valuable field general.

Mr. Obama, who as a U.S. senator in 2007 skeptically grilled Gen. Petraeus on the Iraq war, has turned to the four-star general as perhaps his last chance to win in Afghanistan — the one war the commander in chief views as vital to U.S. security.

Mr. Obama, as a U.S. senator, lectured Gen. Petraeus in the fall of 2007, when the military commander testified that his Iraq troop surge was working. Mr. Obama said it was not.

'We have now set the bar so low that modest improvement — in what was a completely chaotic situation to the point where now we just have the levels of intolerable violence that existed in June of 2006 — is considered success. And it's not. This continues to be a disastrous foreign-policy mistake,' Mr. Obama told Gen. Petraeus.

Last month, the president stood shoulder to shoulder with Gen. Petraeus in the White House Rose Garden as he announced that the general would replace Afghanistan war commander Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, who resigned after making indiscreet remarks to Rolling Stone magazine.

'Gen. Petraeus and I were able to spend some time this morning discussing the way forward,' the president said. 'I'm extraordinarily grateful that he has agreed to serve in this new capacity.'