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Glossary

Jim Comey – Watching the Train Leave the Station

On my best days, I look at others with curiosity. I like to try to imagine their motivations, even if that person does things differently than I would. At the end of day, we each render a judgement, but I try to go there only after imagining what the other person’s shoes feel like. Nothing new in that wisdom, but a struggle to consistently apply.

When I told acquaintances Jim was kind enough to appear on the podcast, I got a range of reactions. (You can listen to our conversation on Spotify here (or find it on Apple Podcasts). A number of people said, “oh, he is controversial.” That’s true. Some liberals think he gave us Trump and some on the right-wing fringe think he is part of a deep state. His story is interesting enough that Showtime made a series about it, which is now on Netflix.

Jim and I briefly crossed paths at my previous employer. We worked in different departments but management meetings were taped and shared, which is where I first saw and heard him. I listened for about a minute and said to myself “this guy is cut from a different cloth” and reached out. As I recall, our first exchange was about a book on Constitutional Law!

I then watched, like many of you, what happened next. He was appointed head of the FBI, which seemed in many ways a dream job for him, a better fit than corporate. His awareness of the battle between good and evil, truth and falsehood, was both inculcated at a young age, reinforced as a teenager when he and his brother were held at gun point and further honed when he worked as US Attorney against mob bosses, something he discusses in his most recent book Saving Justice.

In our conversation, I purposely did not ask about the things that he has already discussed, like what he thinks of Trump. Instead, I wanted to get a sense of his background, the balance we all face between ego and humility, what lessons he has drawn from his experience and other topics. I took away a few lessons.

  1. It all begins when we are young. In Jim’s case, he grew up with a very strong moral compass.

  2. The truth is both difficult to ascertain but also the fundamental force from which other sources of power flow—scientific inquiry, productivity, functional government.

  3. Assume most people either aren’t forthright or aren’t aware of their own flaws.

I’ll be interested to hear what lessons you draw. Enjoy.

-Paul and the rest of the Still Press team.