Apparently, politics at it's best seem to happen in Iraq as democracy is given another chance to prove it's ultimacy as a solution to everything. Still, do anyone have an idea of what is happening lately? A new government was appointed, the different posts seems to have been spread more or less randomly across the major groups, and they will presumably try to earn their places until the elections that may happen next year. But why did another transition happen now? I'm at a loss, (I think).

Also, some kind of ban against militia was passed by the new government, making for instance al-Sadr's insurgence illegal, while it appears to be encouraged to organize under a political "umbrella". I picture this as a good attempt at demilitarizing political organizations, and perhaps also at uniting the different military forces under one government, which will then determine peacefully what their goals should be. It's really a very strange move, though, as almost every single "organization" have some form of militia running around, affiliated with nothing much else than the safety of their neighborhood, even though they carry a flag of some kind of "party". Also, the Kurds will never let the peshmerga, a loosely united militia, under the command of a centralized government. This has been obvious and explicitly declared since the time the idea of a centralized democracy in Iraq was first mentioned - which in turn remove the kind of excecutive power it seems the Shiites and for instance al-Sistani think is appropriate and necessary. On the other hand, the militia ban and the token given in encouraging the rise of political interests organizations, and then perhaps necessarily a dilution of power, might be what the Shiites must accept in order to make sure the long awaited civil war is to be avoided. Or at least that the Kurds do not declare independency, which would be about the same. Yet the possible problem that no real power exists on the macro level might be just the kind of situation that will bring the different groups farther away from each other. So, anyone have a theory on what might happen?

See, didn't mention Bush even once!