In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

Just poking around the web for information on the on again-off again $6 billion payment to Iran, I found this as of June 16 : U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken rejected reports Friday that Washington and Tehran were close to deals on limiting Iran's nuclear program and releasing U.S. citizens detained in the country. "With regard to Iran, some of the reports that we've seen about an agreement on nuclear matters or, for that matter, on detainees, are simply not accurate and not true," Blinken said when asked about indirect talks via Oman. As of August 10, we heard this : The United States and Iran reached a deal on August 10 for Tehran’s release of five Iranian-American dual nationals to house arrest in exchange for Washington’s release of several jailed Iranians and the unfreezing of about $6 billion in Iranian oil revenue. . . . The latest prisoner release is not the first time Iran has demanded ransom payments in exchange for releasing hostage...

Recent developments have focused attention on Ariane Tabatabai, in particular that she is currently Chief of Staff for the US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict. On the other hand, a web search brings up what almost looks like too much information. She appears on web sites as adjunct professor at Goergetown University , Middle East Fellow at the Alliance for Securing Democracy at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and an adjunct senior research scholar at the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) , and the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, which says of her Ariane M. Tabatabai is an associate political scientist at the RAND Corporation. Prior to joining RAND, she served as the director of curriculum and a visiting assistant professor of security studies at the Georgetown University Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and an international civilian consultant for NATO. Previously, Tabatabai ...

I notice as of this morning that the narrative has shifted: over the weekend, and due in large part to the revelations about Robert Malley that emerged in the Tablet report I've linked here , there were initially two intellegence failures, one at the Mossad, which didn't see the Hamas attack from Gaza coming, and one at the FBI, where an Iranian agent, Ariane Tabatabai, currently works as Chief of Staff for the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict. This came on the heels of the revelation that Robert Malley, US Special Envoy to Iran and the architect of Democrat Iran policy since the Clinton administration, had had his security clearance suspended and been placed on leave from his position between April and June of this year. Neither the State nor the Defense Department has been responsive to congressional requests for explanation, and Tabatabai remains in her Defense Department position. As of today, this is all off the radar. L...

There's been a near-immediate consensus that the Hamas invasion over the weekend was a failure of Israeli intelligence, less so that US intelligence missed anything. NBC’s Kristen Welker pressed Blinken on “Meet the Press” on whether it was an intelligence failure. Blinken said that the violence in the region was “an attack that I don’t think anyone saw coming,” but fell short of calling it a failure. . . . Deputy national security adviser Jon Finer also dodged answering whether it was a failure, again reiterating that there will be time in the future to look into it. So far, only a few observers are looking at the causes of the invasion. Yesterday's New York Post editorial is a good start: The Obama administration’s vision saw an empowered Iran as a fulcrum to force action from Israel on the Palestinian question. Thus the Iran deal, which set the mullahs on the path toward nuclear breakout and regional hegemony they are now speeding down. . . . Obama’s Whit...

As of this posting, Robert Malley's Wikipedia entry is a version that was last updated on October 3 , in response to an October 1 story in the Tablet that I linked yesterday. The Wikipedia entry notes, "On June 29, 2023, Malley was placed on unpaid leave as special envoy to Iran, his security clearance was suspended amid an investigation into possible mishandling of classified material." I took note of the Tablet story only over this current weekend, assuming it must have been part of the prior weekend's bad news dump. But as I dug deeper, the story is months old. It was covered in a Washington Post op-ed on September 6 , referring to events four months earlier: Anyone who criticized the Chinese government for its secrecy surrounding the disappearance of former foreign minister Qin Gang (including me) is guilty of hypocrisy unless they acknowledge that the U.S. government is being similarly opaque about the fate of one of America’s top diplomats. Congre...

The news of an attack on Israel leading to the first declaration of war in 50 years has mostly raised questions for me about contexts that I'd been noticing for some time. The first is Biden's recent slights against both Israel's President Herzog, on which I posted here , and Prime Minister Netanyahu, which I covered in this post. On July 18, President Joe Biden seemingly fell asleep today while sputtering gibberish during a high-level meeting with the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog. “The Israelis and the Palestinians… uh… on a political level… They uh, and… uh… They uh… And, I… Agwai endhole and whole shegwam… And uh…” said Biden. My assessment at the time was that this was deliberate, an indication at best that Isreal's head of state wasn't worth Joe's full attention, however pro forma this might seem. Then there was a not fully unequivocal exchange with Prime Minister Netanyahu on September 20: Biden noted that he worked with Netanya...

REPORT: President Biden has “mistreated” his dogs by punching and kicking them according to sources close with Judicial Watch. Biden’s dogs are just like his son: Poorly trained. Documents from the United States Department of Homeland Security, reveal injuries from attacks… pic.twitter.com/dDGRuYxc1P — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) October 6, 2023 The video in the post at X above bothers me in several ways. I've had five pet dogs in my life, none has been a German shepherd, but I think dog body language is pretty consistent across breeds. What I see in the video, if that's his most recent dog, Commander, is Commander being led off the helicopter by Joe and promptly becoming confused. He's on a leash, Joe heads for the limo, Commander hangs back and in fact turns the other way. As best I can read, Commander has his head low and is wagging his tail more or less level to the ground, indicating he's not sure what to do. Joe somewhat awkwardly gathers Commander in, first with...