THREE DUELING NARRATIVES: This morning we begin with three stories involving the war on ISIS where there are counter narratives competing for your attention. In each, one narrative is ominous and worrying, while alternate explanation is less sinister.

THE KUSHNER TRIP: Senior White House adviser Jared Kushner was invited by Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford to tag along on his visit to Baghdad yesterday for meetings with Iraqi President Haider al-Abadi and other Iraqi officials, but on CNN you would have thought it was the other way around. CNN’s Ben Wedeman reported that because the 36-year-old son-in-law of the president “has no diplomatic or military experience” he was being accompanied by Dunford. Ben Rhodes, former Obama foreign policy adviser and speechwriter, tweeted: “Kushner in Iraq before the National Security Advisor or Secretary of State. Totally normal.” Others portrayed the inclusion of Kushner on the Dunford trip as an attempt by the U.S. military to suck up to Trump. Politico called it “the latest example of a conscious outreach campaign by the Pentagon to President Donald Trump.”