Thomas P.M. Barnett

ARTICLE: Shiites Remake Baghdad in Their Image, By SABRINA TAVERNISE, New York Times, December 23, 2006

We hear partition of Iraq is too hard to achieve, but as one reader recently pointed out, the Iraq constitution allows a whole lotta separation, and, as this story points out, the neighborhood-by-neighborhood separation of the major cities (declared unthinkable by James Baker, Mr.-we-don't-have-a-dog-in-this-fight) proceeds pace.

Impossible?

Happens here all the time in the States silently and slowly over time, as races self-segregate in neighborhoods. Likely to be with some real violence in Iraq, but try and stop it. This is just the immaturity and the fakeness of "Iraq" being revealed.

Condition need not be permanent, but the necessary devolution-leading-to-future-reintegration-on-the-basis-of-economic-logic is impossible to obviate in this case, given recent past history.