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* Maliki spokesman Ali Dabbagh criticized representatives of the Ayatollah Sistani for making recommendations respecting elections for provincial councils (a Sistani representative had said merely that they should be held, and promptly, urging an end to the political roadblocks to legislation on this). Dabbagh said the marjaiyyah is to be respected in its guidance on religious matters, but should stay out of politics. This is unusual, and as RoadstoIraq notes, being perhaps an initial sign of a split between the Najaf authorities and Maliki. It should be remembered that Sistani's people have been increasingly blunt in their criticism of the Maliki administration in recent weeks for its incompetence and toleration of widesread corruption.

* AlSharqiyya TV (sister organization to the newspaper Azzaman), which ran a program recently on torture of Iraqis in Iraqi prisons, has been subect in the last few days to a campaign of vilification by the government-run AlIraqiyya TV, and yesterday four of its employees were kidnapped and murdered in Mosul while filming the next episode in a Ramadan series. According to AlHayat, the director of AlSharqiyya linked the killings to the program on torture, and to the campaign of vilification, and said the government-run station bears moral responsibility for the killings. (Remarks by an unnamed McClatchy correspondent on their blog indicate that the campaign against AlSharqiyya is part of the government's "Baathist menace" theme).

* Maliki in person, for his part, has apparently come up with an additional line of defence for his government's performance, blaming none other than Paul Bremer for having created problems in Iraq which his government is still trying to rectify. He said Bremer commited mistakes that are no less serious than those of the terrorists, but the Aswat alIraq summary doesn't refer to any specifics. Maliki showed particular sensitivity to the issue of poor provision of government services to the people. He said: "We have made great efforts to provide basic services like electricity, petroleum derivatives and the ration-card items, and we appreciate the sufferings of the people in the area of these services, which have been in the forefront of the operations of the terrorist and destructive operations over the course of the recent years." Maliki made the remarks in Karbala, where he had gone to speak with Shiite religious authorities by way of defending his government's performance. There is obviously some immediate background to the remarks on Bremer, but it isn't clear what that is).

In any event, it appears that the Maliki administration, under increasing pressure in the face of the cholera epidemic, disclosures about inability to provide political leadership, torture, corruption, and so on, is pushing back against its critics in the only ways it can think of--against its erstwhile allies among the Najaf authorities under the rubric of separation of religion and state, against other domestic critics on the theme of fighting the Baathist menace, and with the errors of Bremer thrown in for good measure.

It isn't clear where this is going to end up, but I think it is important not to lose sight of the fact that the Maliki administration is gradually cutting itself off from, and pushing back against, its traditional supporters, from the authorities in Najaf to the heirs of Bremer in the American Embassy, not to mention the Kurdish warlord parties.