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Iran is turning into N. Korea, as far as the nuclear issue. I think it is clear the Euros, China and Russia don't want to deal with the issue.

The Euros understand they lack the military capacity to put teeth into their complaints. The trips to the UN are their way of staying relevant.

Russia needs the cash. It is just that simple.

China understands this is one more way to tie down the US and thus open opportunities to increase their power in Asia.

At some point, we will have to answer two questions: Will we allow Iran to join the nuclear club and what do we do about it.

Will we allow Iran to join the nuclear club and what do we do about it.

The first thing we can do about it is to get our own affairs in order. Why are we importing energy in the first place? We have plenty of domestic resources that can be developed including nuclear, synthetic fuels, solar energy, our own fossil fuels, and perhaps even an all out alternative to the internal combustion engine. We need to produce our own to help our balance of trade and to weaken these sorts of crackpot tyrants. We might even be able to cut a deal with Russia and Europe to help us accelerate our nuclear roll out in exchange for a bit more political cooperation.

Then we need to focus on destabilizing Chavez in Venezuela. There is still plenty of opposition there and within our own borders to ferment resistance and we can count on help and staging assistance from some of his concerned neighbors. Venezuela has valuable resources and it would be better to bring it back into the fold now, before Chavez's anti-American campaign spreads and grows stronger.

Iraq can probably be control in the short term through a policy of military harassment. Periodically raid to take out some of the key facilities, force them to maintain a high state of alert to exhaust their forces; then, blockade and intercept shipments of contraband at sea, support an insurgency (similar to what they have been doing to us in Iraq), and launch a multi-front economic campaign to discredit the present government in the eyes of the population.

Iran may have an oil weapon, but using it is a little like setting fire to your own house to drive off an intruder. If they use it we will likely benefit at their detriment. It would only serve to accelerate all of the sorts of things that will lead to Irans irrelevancy.