Newsflash: Petraeus and Broadwell Are Very, Very Sad

By Katie J.M. Baker | November 19, 2012 | 5:55pm

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Two recent articles on the Petraeus scandal shed some fascinating new light on the Love Pentagon™ gone wrong: both retired Gen. David Petraeus and Paula Broadwell are unhappy.

According to Politico, Broadwell is “devastated by the fallout from her extramarital affair” with Petraeus. Also: she “deeply regrets the damage that’s been done to her family and everyone else’s, and she is trying to repair that and move forward.” Also, “she requests privacy during this difficult time.” Just kidding, I made that last quote up. Point being: it’s not really that newsworthy that she’s upset that the duo’s failure to delete their digital footprint has captured the unwavering attention of the FBI, the CIA, and the paparazzi. But it is sad.

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Newsweek has the DL on Petraeus: four pages on how the former CIA director was lonely in his new position, and obsessed with exercise, which led to his affair with the similarly fitness-obsessed and very friendly Broadwell. This recap is thorough, but not all that illuminating for those already familiar with the scandal. It’s just sad.

Even sadder? It doesn’t seem like anything else was going on other than lots of consensual sex (and jogging). Those “classified documents” the FBI found in Broadwell’s home? They were most likely outdated info she gathered while researching her biography; Petraeus didn’t leak any classified information in the throes of passion. And doesn’t look like Broadwell was “extracting secrets from Petraeus for a foreign intelligence service,” as the FBI surmised at one point. “By the middle of last summer, the FBI had no evidence of a crime,” Newsweek reports. “They were only left with the tell-tale emails of a love affair that had recently ended by mutual consent.”

And what are we left with? Media outlets struggling to cover a story that is increasingly less scintillating and just…you know.

However! Paul Kranz, Broadwell’s father told Newsweek that we haven’t heard the whole story yet and that “a lot more is going to come out.” My money’s on a secret love child.