Image from Mother JonesWhat's US Ally Talabani Up To? -- Missing Links
There are at least two different versions of the talks that led to postponing the Parliamentary vote until Wednesday. According to the Kuwaiti paper AlWatan, citing unnamed high-level sources that were at these meetings, the process went like this:
(1) It became apparent that a simple majority (half the Parliamentary membership plus one) wasn't going to do the trick, partly because of the fact some of the Shiite UIA members were taking the Sistani injunction to heart, namely that this had to be an approval representing the assent of all parts of Iraqi society. And the simple-majority idea was based on a simple Kurdish-UIA combination. So the Sunni parties and others would have to be brought in.
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My Comment: Iraqi politics is like politics everywhere else ... arm twisting, promises made, favors called in .... etc.
This tells me that the U.S.-Iraq Security Agreement is going to pass with flying colors.