Maybe the Supreme Court can settle this

Some division on who should be president of Iraq could be a blow to the June 30th turnover date.

The US governor of Iraq, Paul Bremer, and the UN special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, insisted the job should go to Adnan Pachachi, an 81-year-old former foreign minister. But the Iraqi governing council demanded that the largely ceremonial post should go to Sheikh Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawar, an Arab businessman in his 40s who has criticised the US-led occupation and who is the council's president.

The row threatens to delay the appointment of a new interim government. A ceremony scheduled for today appeared last night to have been postponed.

Apparently the Iraqi governing council(IGC) feels that Adnan has too close ties to the US and will act more like a puppet than anything else, a view put forth by Dr Mahmoud Othman, a leading council member

"It's like being in a dictatorship again. Adnan follows the Americans around like a puppy. If the Americans told Adnan that yoghurt was black, he would go along with it."

Ghazi however, has been quite vocal about the American influence on Iraq since the war.

In a recent television interview, he blamed America for Iraq's problems. "They occupied the country, disbanded the security agencies and for 10 months left Iraq's borders open for anyone to come in without a visa or passport."

Now this is a post that is largely ceremonial and that the US has said they have little interest in disputing. Yet this delay, as mentioned, could bring that promised transfer of power to a halt. And now if there is failure, the president can say "Look, it's not our fault. We wanted this other guy. The failure in Iraq has nothing to do with us anymore."

Perhaps even more damaging to the future of Iraqi-American relations is this view:

Last night senior Iraqi politicians admitted that despite Mr Brahimi's promise to bring in "non-political" faces and technocrats, the new Iraqi government looked suspiciously like the old one.

Oh, that one we helped in the early 80's, right? And it is nice to see some things never change:

National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 114 of November 26, 1983, "U.S. Policy toward the Iran-Iraq War," delineating U.S. priorities: the ability to project military force in the Persian Gulf and to protect oil supplies, without reference to chemical weapons or human rights concerns.