How Do You Define Government in Iraq?

The Washington Post story referenced below contains a very standard Bush Administration statement to the effect that "the Iraqi Government must take responsibility," and includes the spin of the past couple of weeks that President is getting "frustrated."

Our question, and the question at the heart of the rapidly converging opinions that the situation is now totally out-of-control, is this: by who's definition is there a government in Iraq at all?

Sadr's Army just took the city of Amarah this morning. From whom? The Iraqi "government"?

Governments provide security for their people. Enough said.

Governments assure the provision of essential services. Andrew Sullivan helps us keep track of electricity supply in Baghdad...its down to about 2 hours a day.

And we could, of course, go on and on.

What is abundantly clear is that the is no Maliki government; no government at all in any meaningful way. Does it matter that Maliki played "Shuffle the Shiites" at the top of the police and security forces. Of course not.

And yet the administration continues to talk about the elected government as if it meaningfully existed. And as if its part of a solution, when its perfectly clear that any kind of solution at all is, minute by minute, not just remote, but soon a total fantasy.