to this discussion, if we looked to the origins of the nickname "Betrayus".

Many people are falsely assuming that "Betrayus" was a clever rhyme made up by Moveon.org for the New York Times ad. Which I think is a key assumption for this ad controversy to work for the republicans.

And that assumption is false. The nickname did not originate with Moveon.org.

I clearly remember reading Petraeus's nickname on various military forums/comment threads over two years ago. I remember it so because I thought it was very clever and suitable nickname. In the past couple of months, I have also started seeing the nickname used on progressive blogs and comments.

So when this "controversy" happened yesterday, I did a google search (i swear google really is a blogger's friend!) to see if I could find an old posting or comment that used the nickname.

Here's a comment from 2005:

From BLACKFIVE: Generals of yesterday and today

I don't know GEN Petraeus personally...but when I was in the "Devil Brigade" folks called him "Colonel Betrayus". He came up with things like the "Devil button" (button your BDU collar up to the top when on jumps) and the "Devil grip" (special name for keeping your trigger finger out of the trigger well) which sounded hokey to most of the troops at the time.

Can any other All American paratroopers out there expand on my comment?

Posted by: TBone | November 19, 2005 at 10:52 AM

This kind of changes the narrative, doesn't it?

.