We live in perilous times.

North Korea has announced it would counter U.S. and South Korean joint naval exercises with “nuclear deterrence” after the Obama administration feebly warned the government in Pyongyang shouldn’t take any provocative steps.

According to the Korean Central News Agency, their National Defense Commission said North Korea will:

…legitimately counter with their powerful nuclear deterrence the largest-ever nuclear war exercises to be staged by the U.S. and the South Korean puppet forces.

The maneuvers, will involve 20 vessels and 200 aircraft from the U.S. and South Korea   They pose a threat to the country’s sovereignty and security, Ri Tong Il, an official with North Korea’s delegation to the Asean Security Forum, claimed to reporters in Hanoi on Saturday.

Ri’s comments followed North Korean Foreign Minister Pak Ui Chun sitting in the same room with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Hanoi for a security meeting of Asia’s largest powers. Clinton blasted North Korea for being “on a campaign of provocative, dangerous behavior,” urging Kim Jong Il’s regime to change.

Still, the “door remains open for North Korea,” Clinton later told reporters:

We are willing to meet with them, willing to negotiate, to move toward normal relations.

… if North Korea commits itself to giving up its nuclear weapons program, she said.  I’m sure they will comply, Hillary.

U.S. State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said in Washington on Saturday that North Korea:

would be better served by reflecting on the current situation, not taking any further aggressive actions or provocative steps.

Meanwhile, in Washington, a former CIA director says military action against Iran now seems more likely because no matter what the U.S. does diplomatically, Tehran keeps building nuclear weapons.

Michael Hayden, a CIA chief under President George W. Bush, says that while he was serving, a strike was “way down the list” of options. But he tells CNN’s “State of the Union” that such action now “seems inexorable.”

Hayden says Iran will build its program to the point where it’s just below having an actual weapon. He believes that would be as destabilizing to the region as the real thing.

U.S. officials say that military action remains an option if sanctions fail to deter Iran.

Iran deflects criticism by claiming its nuclear work is for peaceful purposes such as power generation.

As if these to situations weren’t being mishandled enough by Obama and his minions, our government secretly advised Scottish ministers it would be “far preferable” to free the Lockerbie bomber than jail him in Libya.

Correspondence obtained by The Sunday Edition of The London Times shows that the Obama administration considered compassionate release more palatable than locking up Abdel Baset al-Megrahi in a Libyan prison.

The outrageous intervention, which brought the wrath of the US relatives of those who died in the attack, was agreed upon by Richard LeBaron, deputy head of the US embassy in London, a week before Megrahi was freed in August last year on grounds that he had terminal cancer.

Acquired by a well-placed US source, the document illuminates a tremendous prevarication in Obama’s claim last week that all Americans were “surprised, disappointed and angry” to learn of Megrahi’s release.

Scottish ministers mistakenly viewed the level of US resistance to compassionate release as “half-hearted” and a sign it would be accepted.

The Obama administration has tried to keep the letter secret.  They refused to give permission to the Scottish authorities to publish it on the flimsy excuse that releasing it would prevent future “frank and open communications” with other governments.

In a letter sent on August 12 last year to Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond and justice officials,  Mr LeBaron wrote that the US wanted Megrahi to remain imprisoned because of the nature of the crime.

The note added:

Nevertheless, if Scottish authorities come to the conclusion that Megrahi must be released from Scottish custody, the US position is that conditional release on compassionate grounds would be a far preferable alternative to prisoner transfer, which we strongly oppose.

Mr LeBaron also claimed that freeing the bomber and exiling him to Scotland:

…would mitigate a number of the strong concerns we have expressed with regard to Megrahi’s release.

Obama’s administration lobbied the Scottish government more strongly against sending Megrahi home, under a prisoner transfer agreement signed by the British and Libyan governments, in a deal now known to have been linked to a pound stg. 550 million oil contract for BP.

Megrahi was released by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill on the grounds that he had three months to live, making his sentence effectively spent.

A probe was launched by the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee after The Sunday Times revealed this month that Megrahi’s doctors thought he could live for another decade.  It’s a miracle!  Did this guy meet up with Benny Hinn?

According to a source close to the Senate inquiry:

The (LeBaron) letter is embarrassing for the US (adminstration) because it shows they were much less opposed to compassionate release than prisoner transfer.

Last week, a succession of British politicians, including former justice secretary Jack Straw, delivered a diplomatic snub to the committee by refusing to fly across the Atlantic to answer questions at the Senate’s hearing on Thursday (US time) about their role in Megrahi’s release.

Then, right in the middle of the controversy over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and Megrahi’s release, news broke over the weekend that BP is planning deep-water drilling off Libya.

And BP boss Tony Hayward is rumored to be resigning this week when the company announces its half-year results, London’s Sunday Telegraph reported.

What a coincidence.

In an article posted on April 10, 2009, columnist Gerald Warner of telegraph.co.uk coined the title President Pantywaist for Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm).  He gave him this nickname after Obama:

…recently completed the most successful foreign policy tour since Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow. You name it, he blew it. What was his big deal economic programme that he was determined to drive through the G20 summit? Another massive stimulus package, globally funded and co-ordinated. Did he achieve it? Not so as you’d notice. 

Given the way America’s enemies are laughing at America and spitting in our face, the way that Obama has arrogantly alienated our foreign allies, and the President’s Steve Urkel-esque naiveté as exhibited by his Smart Power Foreign Policy, I would say Mr. Warner hit the nail on the head.

Sources:  Bloomberg.com, yahoo.com,theaustralian.com.au