Interesting...I have two observations/questions:
1) Iran has to import about 40% refined oil; wouldn't an increase in price affect it as well?
2) Opec/Oil producing nations know that there is an invisible limit to how much they can push it or the conversion to alternative energy sources/locations will happen quicker than they'd like and they'll end up with a fisful of sand. The technology is there...the last thing they want is to provide us with the political will, surely?
All the best,
Marlow

I agree with your assessment of the situation.

However the USA will not be able to solve this problem. The USA is much to fearful to show any real commitment to the words they speak.

Does the only nation in the world which has ever used nuclear WMD against the population of another country have any moral high ground to stand on when it is telling others that they may not have them?

Who is going to listen to the nation with uses terrorism as it main weapon and was even convicted for it by an international court?

Who is going to believe a nation which supported the apartheid in South-Africa and once labeled the ANC as one of the most dangerous terrorist organisations in the world?

Who is going to trust a nation which clearly believes only in "might makes right"?

How many resolutions would the USA have violated if it had no veto? What does that say about it position on the world stage?

When is the USA going to demonstrate that they are prepared to walk the path which they asks others to walk? When is the USA going to give up their WMD? When is the USA going to give up their veto in the UN?

Iran is doing its passive-aggressive posturing to influence Europe, Russia & China. The real power in the Persian Gulf is the U.S. Navy, which has the ability to choke off oil exports from any nation, especially Iran. Since Iran has invaded U.S. soverign territory (the embassy in Tehran), we have a legal casus belli. An effective naval blockade(our own act of war), by taking oil tankers trading with Iran as prizes, would call their bluff. The U.S. Navy would capture the tankers and have the ships condemned in an admiralty prize court. The oil would be sold to the highest bidder. The U.S. Navy would receive the proceeds. This overcomes the deficiencies of the U.N. Oil-for-Food program used against Iraq. It puts all the benefits of Iranian oil exports in American pockets. The United States uses its naval might to tell Iran "do as we say and no one gets hurt". Without oil exports, Iran is a barren desert. And no nation can militarily break the blockade, or factually complain that the process does not respect international (Admiralty)law.

I agree with you for the most part, and I appreciate your insight. However, I noticed you used the phrase "Bush thing" to describe action against Iran versus doing nothing.

Recall that Iran was very much an up-and-coming threat in 2003, moreso than Iraq, which was seriously weakened from sanctions/strikes and unable to develop WMDs without extensive rebuilding. True, at the time Iran was obeying the UN and had their facilities under lock and supervision, but in any case their facilities were intact. Obviously, they possessed the capability to start them up at any time and develop WMDs at a pace Saddam could only dream of.

Perhaps Bush believed that creating a beacon for Democracy in Iraq would prevent Iran from ever taking this step. However, believing doesn't make it so, and mangling the rebuilding of Iraq surely didn't help. In some respects, Bush's actions against Iraq may have provoked Iran to break the locks, not only to protect themselves but out of a lessened fear of reprisal, since our military is already stretched thin in Iraq and Bush set a precedent of ignoring the UN security council.

So in conclusion, I have to point out: if we were to do the "Bush thing" today, we would have to ignore more pressing threats such as Iran, instead attack Uzbekistan, Liechtenstein, or some other country which has no prospect of threatening us in the forseeable future, and then mis-manage the rebuilding process. That way we will find ourselves between an even bigger rock and an even harder place, where more countries are allied against us, threatening us with oil and nuclear weapons, publicly mocking us for attacking a non-threatening country--which we are now struggling to rebuild--in the first place.

Sure Presidents and other public servants are human who don't always handle things correctly, but that doesn't make it any easier to deal with the consequences now.

I propose we don't do the "Bush thing" and instead do something actually effective: get somebody to hire somebody to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities. Maybe a Venezuelan? Not very ethical, I know, but neither is war, and at least it's a suggestion.

I'll be waiting for the emails claiming I'm unpatriotic or am not supporting the troops. Bring 'em on.

I doubt that there was or is anything that we could have done that would have stopped Iran from taking the path they are on. They have been actively at war with us since 1979. In my post today, I wrote that the psychology of Ahmadinejad and the ruling Mullahs that are behind him, makes war unavoidable. Briefly, their version of Islam requires expansion of the caliphate by the proper Muslims (Iranian Shi'ism) or an Apocalyse to usher in the 12th Imam. They have no trouble with the idea of either killing the infidels or blowing themselves up in order to kill the infidels. Once they have a few bombs it woudl only be a matter of time.

The scenario I envision is more along the lines of an internecine cold war between the Shi'a and Sunni factions of Islam.

Already, Egypt has declared (diplomatically) that it would rather that Iran not have Da Bomb. I would have to imagine that the remainder of the rump states of the Southern Med (who typically follow Egypt's lead) will join in.

The very big, very old, very rich dog in the region that hasn't barked yet is the KSA. How do you think Riyadh would feel about Iran trying to re-establish Persian pre-eminence in the region? And how will the PRC factor into this, if at all?

I hesitate to ever (EVER!) say that Pat Robertson was right, but assassinating Hugo Chavez back when the Venezuelan coup was going down probably would have been geopolitically a good move for the U.S. Now we have Bolivarista heads of state in Ecuador and Chile to contend with thanks to the Brothers Marx (Hugo and Fidel).

Bleach.

Dear GMLK -

You state openly that the US is in no position to "solve" the Iranian crises because it lacks the moral authority to do so. In this, you pose a series of charges against the US to show it is uniquely perfidious and thus unworthy:

"Does the only nation in the world which has ever used nuclear WMD against the population of another country have any moral high ground to stand on when it is telling others that they may not have them?"

By stripping all context we are left with a pretty stark choice, aren't we? The US is uniquely evil because it is the only nation to use nuclear weapons! Of course, the US was itself faced with a pretty stark choice in 1945, wasn't it? Nuclear weapons were used by a nation exhausted by war and who were not willing to give up 100s of thousands more of its young men in an effort to subdue a vicious aggressor nation. What responsibility did we have to attempt a 'soft landing' for the Japanese while still at war? Was it not enough that we offered an astonishingly humane and productive post-war occupation for them? Given mankind's history of atrocities after victory, how can you possibly fail to see why the world should indeed judge the US as having earned the right to judge other nations?

More to the point, how can you fail to see the difference between a Iran's expansionist aggression and America. Iran has no need to develop such weaponry now. America, on the other hand, was a nation literally exhausted and out of better options when it finally committed to the use of these weapons. Do you see no difference between the bully who threatens a club to the head of those who dare oppose his aggressive plans and the man backed into a corner who grabs a stick to beat an aggressor who has already attacked him viciously?

Your remaining rant makes no sense to me at all. A "terrorist nation?" By any honest take, we've been indicted as a "terrorist nation" only by those who oppose the entire modern project of democratic capitalism and who'll smear anyone who pursues it with whatever calumny seems most likely to rend a pound of flesh.

South Africa? Please - not only is it old news, no one in a position of power in America today would dare support a return to South Africa's apartheid. Worse yet, how can you sling this charge against the nation that fought a bloody civil war to end slavery when dozens of African and Islamic states still practice de facto (or even de jure) slavery today?

UN Resolutions? Talk to me when oppressive police states are no longer permitted to sit on the "Human Rights" committees.

Our lack of perfection, my friend, does not excuse others their vicious tyrannies despite your best efforts to blur it all into a single moral equivalence.

I don't have to defend facts which anyone can find in the archives and history lessons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaragua_v._United_States
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Court_of_Justice

The point I made was that the USA might want to consider a more humble and realistic attitude towards the world. It claims a position of moral authority which it has no right to, unless it practices what it preaches. Which history shows, it does not.

My "rant" was an observation that this is not a level playing field, not a cry for change. I can not imagine that the USA will be prepared to level the playing field. What I do not understand is the incredible amount of fear and paranoia in the USA, and at the same time its total lack of empathy for the position of other
nations. These two facts are maybe related: If the USA could feel any empathy it might not be so fearful?

You're right that human right violators should not be permitted to sit on the human rights committees, but one of the nation who violate human rights is the USA. Nearly any nation does so from time to time, some more then other, it's a natural function of the "nation" concept. We may deny it, but that does not change the facts: The continuous existence of the nation is more valuable then the rights of an individual.

You're also right that one should not blur this in to a single moral equivalence, I did not intend to do so. We have here a complex world of stronger and weaker imperfect nations. Each at a different point of their development. That the weak seek to become strong is only natural, that the strong want to remain stronger is also only natural.

What positive motivation can we give the weak to decide to choose to remain weak? If there is none, then we are in trouble. If the strong use force to keep them weak, this will only fuel the desire to become stronger. This is why the USA will not be able to resolve this.

We tend to define superpower in terms of our ability to destroy.
Real superpower however is the ability to create and protect life. In that sense the only conclusion is that there is no superpower in this world and until there is, these problems will only get worse.