Seeds of Gridlock in Iraq
My op-ed, “How the US is sowing gridlock in Iraq” is available online at the San Jose Mercury News. I worry in it about the Rube Goldberg executive in the Basic Law or interim constitution, with its three presidents and a prime minister (the presidents have to make all decisions unanimously as a council!). I worry about the single-chamber legislature, with its assured Shiite majority (have you ever been in a parliamentary minority and tried to stand against the majority? You just get voted down every time). I worry about the small ethnically-based parties with militias that have the real political momentum in Iraq. I am skeptical that this system is going to be a beacon to the worldly Syrians and the urbane Egyptians, as Richard Perle (that great Arabist) insists.