Shhh

Don't use the word Civil War. We prefer "unscheduled constitutional renegotiation/demographic restitution."

KIRKUK, Iraq - Iraq's Kurdish president called on the country's Shiite prime minister to step down, the spokesman for the president's party said Sunday, escalating a political split between the two factions that make up the government.

Sunni Arab leaders, meanwhile, were angered after the Shiite-dominated parliament passed a new ruling on a key Oct. 15 that makes it more difficult for Sunnis to defeat the draft constitution that they oppose.

The political wrangling deepened the splits between Iraq's three main communities amid a constitutional process that was aimed at bringing them together to build a democratic nation. Kurds complained that Shiites were monopolizing the government, while Sunnis — who have made up the backbone of the violent insurgency — accused Shiites of stacking the deck against them in the political process.

So we've got a split between the well-armed Kurds, the majority Shia, and the insurgent Sunnis. And this is within the political arena - you know, the "success story." Meanwhile, Billmon quotes a US representative on the Catch-22 the Iraqis have been put in:

Officials say that if the constitution is defeated, insurgents will most likely believe that they have won a significant victory and be encouraged to fight on. Conversely, it is said, the insurgency will grow stronger if the voters approve the constitution, because that will anger Sunnis who opposed it and empower Sunni insurgents who can claim that their views were ignored.

So we're screwed. Good to know.

Honestly - where's the good news here? The constitution is either a) a dead letter, or b) will pass, but simply highten the bloodshed. Nobody honestly seems to expect the killing to stop. At most, the constitution will pass and give the Bush administration ass-cover to pull out and let things fall apart in Iraq. The worse, and a fear more likely possibility, is that the US doesn't leave, and stays on to back the Shia against the Sunnis, or something like that. As others have pointed out, this might temporarily solve problems in Iraq, but would make things much worse worldwide - the vast majority of Muslims outside of Iran and Iraq are Sunni, so having Shias killing Sunnis with US training and weaponry is just incredibly bad PR, aside from anything else. Maybe not as bad as Israeli F-15s, but you get my point.