The Ministry of Alternate Realities

Iraq's new Prime Minister Jawad al-Maliki:

"We are going to form a family that will not be based on sectarian or ethnic backgrounds... Each ministry will be run professionally and not as minister's own property, dictated by his ethnic background."

and he also said:

"Those who will join the new government should realize that they are ministers of the people and the homeland, and not the party."

Or to put it in context...

"a family that will not be based on sectarian ..."

From Iraq the Model: Fadheela Party wants to keep the oil ministry while the Sadrists want to keep the public service ministries they held like the education, transportation and health

"... or ethnic backgrounds"

Kurdish MP Mahmoud Othman says he expected the Kurds to be assigned six of Iraq's 30 ministries, including the foreign affairs portfolio they hold in the outgoing government.

"If not, we want either the oil or finance ministry," Othman said, adding that the Kurds were not asking for security posts.

"Those who will join the new government should realize that they are ministers of the people and the homeland, and not the party."

The PM's own Da'wa party newspaper, Al Bayan quoted a leading Shia politician as promising that the Shia "will ask to lead either the ministry of interior or defense and will not relinquish (both posts) even if there is pressure from other slates."

It doesn't give me much hope for anything workable to come out of the current Iraqi government. And the FT agrees:

The US has hailed Mr Maliki's emergence as a decisive step forward, but without much conviction. A more realistic approach may emerge from the congressionally mandated Iraq Study Group, headed by James Baker, former secretary of state.