“The danger posed by North Korea’s threatening activities warrants action by the international community,” Mr Obama said in a written statement.

So, what “action” will the President of the strongest nation in the world possibly be talking about? One only needs to look at what he said in 2006 during an interview with the late Tim Russert.

You know, what I would do is, at this point, given the provocation of the recent nuclear test, I think let’s try to get these sanctions to work. I think the administration—which had not done a very good job on the North Korea issue, partly because it had been bogged down in Iraq—right now is taking some of the right steps. Let’s reconvene the six-party talks. China and South Korea are central to those efforts. But I think that in time it would make sense for us to initiate some bilateral conversations on—in parallel with the six-party talks, partly because it would strengthen, I think, the commitment of China and South Korea to really put some pressure on North Korea.

So, in 2006, we talked and surely that should have worked, right? Obviously, it didn’t. Thankfully, in President Obama’s statement following the test he DID outline what those “actions” are that he says are warranted this time:

“We have been and will continue working with our allies and partners in the Six-Party Talks as well as other members of the U.N. Security Council in the days ahead.”

Good idea, let’s keep talking. If we’re lucky, two years from now the nuclear explosion won’t be on the heads of our South Korean troops or, God forbid, in our own country.

Unfortunately, our President doesn’t believe in attacking North Korea. Why? Well, again, here’s what he said during that 2006 interview.

MR. RUSSERT: Would you invade North Korea?

SEN. OBAMA: No, I don’t think that’s an option. They’ve got a million troops in uniform, very well trained.

By golly, our military could never defeat a million North Korean troops! Whatever will we do? Who’s afraid of the big, bad Kim Jong Il?