What we did, accomplished, and refuse to face has lead to

From AP for July 3:

Tensions between Shiite Arabs and the Sunni minority are rapidly worsening, pushing Iraq closer to a civil war that could disrupt its young democracy and lead to its breakup. ...

In the face of spiraling violence ... anti-Sunni sentiments among Shiite leaders are being articulated publicly, with impunity and tacit approval from powerful political circles.

On Tuesday, a Shiite lawmaker joined [senior Shiite politician Abdul-Aziz] al-Hakim's call for vigilante groups, finding so much support in parliament that some fellow Shiites forfeited their turn to speak so he could finish. ...

Shiite-Sunni tensions were most palpable at the June 26 ceremony marking the bombing deaths in Karradah and Shula. It was held at the offices of Iraq's biggest Shiite party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

Many in the 2,000-strong crowd cheered the Badr Brigade - a Shiite militia associated with al-Hakim's party and which many Sunnis accuse of targeting their community. ...

"Al-Sistani is the sword of the Shiites, if he gives the order we will burn down Latifiyah," they chanted, alluding to the Sunni town south of Baghdad notorious for killings of Shiites. ...

Shiite tribal sheiks, meanwhile, have been begging al-Sistani to issue a fatwa, or edict, permitting them to go after Sunnis who kill their fellow Shiites, according to Iraqis familiar with the meetings held at the cleric's home in the holy city of Najaf.

Sistani, to his credit, has refused - so far. But if the pressure continues to mount, the tensions continue to increase, and the death toll continues to rise, he may be very hard put to maintain that stand. If he wavers, the dam may well burst.

The prospect of a bloodbath engulfing Iraq in a bitter civil war is something else about which I - along with a good number of others, including government analysts - have expressed great concern. So far, that bullet has been dodged, but the gun is still loaded and shots, both figurative and literal, keep getting fired.

Some, to their credit, are keeping up the dance. On Monday,

Dr. Adnan Al-Dulami, spokesman of the General Conference for Sunnis in Iraq, called on Sunnis "to organize themselves to take part in the coming elections and to start to register their names at the offices of the electoral commission."

He said Sunni clerics would soon issue a religious decree repeating the call.

If that call actually does come and if it comes from a significant quarter such as the Association of Muslim Scholars (Hayat Al-Ulama Al-Muslimin, also known as the Muslim Clerics Association) as opposed to a handful of lesser-known individuals, it could represent yet another successful dodge, another step back from that brink that keeps getting approached.

Even so, contrary to the happy talk emanating from Washington (and Baghdad, for that matter), over time the political divisions appear to be worsening, not improving. In early June, the Association of Muslim Scholars

denounced the Iraqi government decision to extend the period of foreign forces in Iraq. The association affirmed its opposition to foreign troops in Iraq and said the troop withdrawal was a condition for the group to participate in the political process,

according to Al-Mashriq, published daily by Al-Mashriq Institution for Media and Cultural Investments and reported via IPM for June 8.

It gets worse: Al-Bayyna, a weekly newspaper issued by the Hezbollah Movement in Iraq (IPM, June 22), claimed that

[s]ources close to Belgium authorities organizing the international conference about Iraq said they ... received a message from Harith al-Dhari saying that it is he who represents Iraq. He said the government of Ibrahim al-Ja'afari lacks legitimacy.

Harith al-Dhari is the secretary general of the Association of Muslim Scholars. That is a hard position from which to stand down. So if that report is accurate (a real if, it should be noted; I read somewhere recently of an Iraqi who said rumors are "as common as dates" in Iraq) it indicates an absolute break - not just a division or a gap, a total wall - between the interim government and a significant part of the Sunni community. And that clearly, clearly would be a harbinger of civil war.

And that, at the end of it all, is what we have produced: A constant, daily threat of civil war and all that goes with it. What a victory for democracy.

Footnote: Doonesbury for July 6:

Duke, In Iraq, watching fighting: How can all my bodyguards be dead? The insurgency is supposed to be in its "last throes!"
Honey: According to whom, sir?
Duke: That weasel Cheney! He said it again on CNN...
Duke: He even looked up "throes" in the dictionary to make sure he had it right.
Honey: Shouldn't he have looked up "last?"

And so it goes.