The Civil War in Iraq is now on.

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Oct. 3 - Iraq's Shiite and Kurdish leaders quietly adopted new rules over the weekend that would make it virtually impossible for the constitution to fail in the coming national referendum.

The move prompted Sunni Arabs and a range of independent political figures to complain that the vote was being fixed. .......

Under the new rules, the constitution will fail only if two-thirds of all registered voters - rather than two-thirds of all those actually casting ballots - reject it in at least 3 of the 18 provinces.

The change, adopted during an unannounced vote in Parliament on Sunday afternoon, effectively raises the bar for those who oppose the constitution. Given that fewer than 60 percent of registered Iraqis voted in the January elections, the chances that two-thirds would both show up at the polls and vote against the document in three provinces would appear to be close to nil.

I think the civil war is now officially on. Imagine, for example, that ten days before an election the rules were changed by the republicans to require that in order for a republican to lose his seat, 50% of the registered voters had to vote for the other guy.

And this is especially heinous as the US forces in Iraq have been cleaning out the populations of whole towns in the Sunni dominated areas in the latest offensives.

Imagine my example above requiring 50% of registered voters being required in New Orleans right now. This is the scale of this change. Oh, and notice the key phrase "unannounced vote in Parliament on Sunday afternoon."

Oh, and it gets worse.

In their vote on Sunday, the Shiite and Kurdish members interpreted the law as follows: the constitution will pass if a majority of ballots are cast for it; it will fail if two-thirds of registered voters in three or more provinces vote against it. In other words, the lawmakers designated two different meanings for the word "voters" in one passage.

The civil war is now truly on.