zenpundit.com

[ by Charles Cameron — first of two posts ]
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Our friend Scott just observed:

This blog has been getting a little partisan since November…can we go back to being a little more objective?

Here’s the first of two posts in an initial attempt at balance, one from myself and one from Zen, both about today’s Comey testimony.

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Was this the day a boil burst?
‘

Was this the day a boil burst on the neck of universe?
Universe is too large,
even solar system exaggerates,
Jove Pater may be keeping a paternal eye on us,
there may even be villages in New Guinea
where John Frum is the news topic of the day,
but as Dan Rather just said of Comey’s testimony,
This scene is going to be written about fifty, a hundred,
two hundred years from now; there’s something
Shakespearean about it, in more current terms,
House of Cards..

My mind drifted from the Comey hearings,
and came back, I wondered where it had gone, given
the intensity of the moment,
volcanic maybe, though all moments
have seemingly a sort of priority in their own times
like a balcony in Escher bulging because,
well, because he’s seeing it, making it his focus..
My mind must have wandered,
that’s the metaphor, down to the banks of Lethe,
dipped in, gotten ah somehow baptized,
deep baptized,
so that Lethe, the banks of Lethe,
the steps leading down to the banks of Lethe
all vanished, all submerged,
gone down into oblivion, known
only because once there was mind on Comey
and I woke to mind gone.

Pure Buddhism, pure any meditative practice..
Mind here, gone,
and meanwhile the volcano,
Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, boil,
has burst,
spewed forth evidence Mueller
like a small planetary Jove Pater can work with
in his own moments volcanic —
just an American,
or not quite only an American Jove Pater —
manwhile, Trump ever Mercurial,
Comey stellar..

Speaking of stars, whoah!
Catastrophe,
meaning literally: a downward-turning of the stars.

[ by Charles Cameron — not the most politically relevant quote from Comey, but perhaps the most curious ]
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It’s not every day you get to see Lao Tzu playing out in the natsc arena:

Sources:

Stephen Mitchell, tr., Tao Te Ching, chapter 56

Politico, James Comey testimony transcript on Trump and Russia

[ by Charles Cameron — Tankel’s take on Trump’s CT ]
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Mostly the self-devouring snakes I track here are a little more subtle about the circular nature of their logic — the phrasing often hides the fact that man bites self, or dog chases own tail. This example, however, is just so blatant, presented in so large and darkna font, with its accompanying image just so dazzlingly colored, that I just has to bring it here.

Self-defeating, self-eating — it’s the self- part that signals trouble. Stephen Tankel is a fine researcher — his book Storming the World Stage: The Story of Lashkar-e-Taiba is recommended readng on the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

He is not a happy chap:

The emerging Trump counterterrorism strategy appears to be a dysfunctional combination of repurposed elements of the George W. Bush and Barack Obama approaches infused with some of Trump’s worst impulses

You may wish to read him.

**

Meanwhile, as an ad to accompany CNN’s Iran’s Revolutionary Guards blame Saudis for Tehran attacks, I got this:

Okay ouroboroi!

[ by Charles Cameron — on the distinction between philo and agapo in Greek, loyalty and honesty in public service ]
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If you are familiar with the Gospel of John, you may recall the passage in which Christ questions Peter (upper panel below) which is often rendered in English “Do you love me?” “You know that I love you” (thrice — but which is subtler in the Greek, since Christ twice asks Peter if he loves him (unselfishly, most deeply), to which Peter responds that he likes him (feels affectionate or friendy love for him) — and on the third occasion, Christ uses Peter’s choice of verb, “Do you feel friendoy towards me?” and Peter answers, “Yes, you know I do.”

There’s an eerie echo of that conversation in Jim Comey‘s prepared remarks for his tesimony before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence tomorrow (lower panel, above).

Comey twice avoids giving his verbal assent to loyalty, which Trump each time asks for, ansd on the third occasion goes part way to meet him with an assurance of “honest loyalty.”

Comey goes on to testify:

As I wrote in the memo I created immediately after the dinner, it is possible we understood the phrase “honest loyalty” differently, but I decided it wouldn’t be productive to push it further. The term – honest loyalty – had helped end a very awkward conversation and my explanations had made clear what he should expect.

Both Christ and Comey strike me as attempting twice to hold their interlocutor to a higher standard than that which he proposes, while tactfully making a verbal concession on the third attempt…

[ by Charles Cameron — sometimes a flurry of tweets can be the thing itself — see also today Michael Kenney on al-Muhajiroun ]
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Here you go — Daveed as recommended by Phillip Smyth just now: today

Assuming that ISIS was behind the Tehran attack, as it has claimed, I have a few observations.

1) Attacking Iran differentiates ISIS from al-Qaeda. AQ has probably wouldn’t attack Iran due to the contours of the AQ/Iran relationship. Similarly, ISIS propagandized against the Taliban by arguing that they wouldn’t fight Pakistan, while ISIS was killing Pakistani soldiers. So there’s an obvious propaganda play ISIS can make here for a Sunni audience, parallel to its earlier Pakistan propaganda.

2) Iran is at the forefront of pushing ISIS’s caliphate back. So this is similar to other ISIS attacks against coalition countries. Nor is it clear that ISIS is concerned about provoking Iran: They already have provoked Iran. It’s fighting them on the ground now.

3) Wild card possibility: Unlikely, but could ISIS be making a play for Sunni state support, similar to what al-Qaeda gets? There are various reasons that I would bet against this, but I would put it on the table as a possibility, however remote.