I thought North Korea was suspected of having a few bombs before the flare-up with Bush? I'm not saying Bush made good decisions but some of their bombs were made earlier but never tested.

Perhaps I'm too naive to get all upset about this, but between this and the Chinese underwear navy attack a few weeks ago, or the Russians talking about sending bombers to Cuba, I find myself wondering why there was such a big ado about Biden saying Obama would be tested at the beginning of his presidency.

So how soon, or how exactly will the Republicans make this a dig against Obama?

This situation is *not* exceedingly dangerous. It's being thoroughly hyped. The chances that North Korea will attack South Korea, Japan, or the United States are negligible to none. Didn't we learn our lesson from Iraq?

lamh31: So how soon, or how exactly will the Republicans make this a dig against Obama?

some nutjobs on right blogs are already suggesting obama is weak because he didn't launch a nuclear strike...

gop 2009: armageddon for freedom!

The most irritating meme is the quote about how it can reach "U.S. Territory"--by which they mean Guam? Saipan? A US ship?
Whereas the U.S. can turn mainland North Korea into glass in response. They're supposed to be "evil", not "stupid".

The most irritating meme is the quote about how it can reach "U.S. Territory"--by which they mean Guam? Saipan? A US ship?

No, I saw an awesome graphic on Fox News yesterday that ended with an explosion in Los Angeles.

Did North Korea sign on to any of these "international agreements" or or are they all agreements made amongst other members of the international community that are being forced down the North Korean's throats. There's a general hysteria at reign over this in the US media that seems out of proportion to the reality and size of the actual threat. And the most irritating of all the memes is the "international agreement" one, when I'm pretty certain that North Korea never signed on to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, nor in all probability has it signed on to any Non-Proliferation of Ballistic Missiles treaty either.

CarlP,

"I thought North Korea was suspected of having a few bombs before the flare-up with Bush?"

When President Clinton left office, all of the prior spent fuel that could have been reprocessed into weapons grade plutonium had been safely sealed and under 24/7 video surveillance by the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) inspectors.

Chimpy violated the 1994 'Agreed Framework', which the North Koreans had abided by, when they reneged on the delivery of the heavy fuel oil that had been contractually promised to compensate for the loss of energy production from the shutdown of the nuclear power plant.

Only then did North Korea kick the IAEA inspectors of the country, unseal and reprocess the spent fuel into weapons grade plutonium, and create an estimated dozen nuclear weapons.

[...] the Chinese underwear navy attack a few weeks ago [...] -- Danp. @8:27

They sent bad smells in the direction of our ships?

NK is a big mess and we moved backwards on this almost the whole time Bush was in office. Restarting the six party talks could maybe move things forward. Only China can apply leverage to keep NK in line. Reunification looked possible (till it died from lack of support by Bush) of NK to SK which is chancy because nobody knows what's going to happen when the head nutjob running NK dies. Probably one of his generals grabs power and we go back to the status quo.

We've lost much of our economic leverage over China in the last eight years especially with our recent economic implosion. The key indicators on all of this is to watch the relationships between Taiwan and China, and Japan and China. As we lose economic clout, we may actually see Taiwan link up with China (a sign that Taiwan/US power can no longer maintain Taiwan's independence). Plus we could see Japan link up with China (they do hate each other, but Japan is going to get slammed by the economic implosion and will do what it as to do), or go nuke to make sure they do NOT have to link with China, and can clobber NK. (Japan has the technology to go nuke very fast.)

Bottom line - we are losing our ability to influence events in this region. Bush dramatically accelerated this process and where predictions ten years ago were that China would dominate the region in 2040 to 2050, the latest estimates are that this could happen by 2015 to 2020. Bush screwed up foreign policy and our economic clout (which is actually our most potent foreign policy tool) and we are paying the price.

What was particularly laughable today was the American Military Industrial Complex claiming that North Korea insisting that the launch was intended to put a satellite into orbit was a fraud. This from the crowd that for more than two decades foisted the fraud of rigged "successful" test launches of their fantasy "Star Wars" missile defense.

Sounds like N Korea is grocery shopping again. Whenever too many people starve they do something goofey and the world sends them stuff. Too proud to beg you know.