NOTE:  This article is cross-posted at Confederate Yankee.

Well, now they’ve done it, and the United States is fighting back with every tool at its disposal:

1) The United States “…will use the plot to marshal international pressure…” against those responsible.

2) Attorney General Eric Holder said: “The United States is committed to holding [them] accountable for [their] actions.”

3) A “State Department Official” called it a “flagrant violation of international law.”

And then we brought out the really big gun:

“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said we’d work with allies to “send a very strong message that this kind of action, which violates international norms, must be ended.”

She also said:

This “crosses a line,” and she and President Obama are calling international leaders to tell them what happened. She said Mr. Obama and she intend to “pre-empt” any efforts by [them] to deny responsibility, and to “enlist more countries in working together against what is becoming a clearer and clearer threat…”

One might be tempted to think that this situation—whatever it is and whoever it involves—is a very serious matter and that our government will respond with the kind of righteous rage demonstrated after 9-11.  It is a very serious matter indeed, but that’s where reality breaks down.

As reported at Fox News, we’ve intercepted an Iranian plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to America, with explosives, on American soil.  Iranian members of the Quds Force,” a paramilitary spy/internal security force pursued a hit on the Ambassador by trying to hire what they thought was a Mexican drug cartel to make the attack.  Two Iranian agents were captured and others remain at large.

Would this be the same Iran:

1) that constantly threatens to obliterate Israel and the United States?

2) that has been killing Americans and American soldiers for decades?

3) that is the foremost state sponsor of terrorism in the world?

4) that sponsors terrorists that kill the citizens of our allies around the world?

5) that threatens to turn the Middle East in a charnel house of unimaginable proportions?

6) that is feverishly producing nuclear weapons and which plans to use them in an EMP attack on America?

7) that is building missile bases in Venezuela and infiltrating every Latin American country that will have it?

8) that is working daily to infiltrate sleeper cells into America for future attacks?

9) that is working with cartels and Marxists south of our border to facilitate any and every kind of harm to Americans they can devise?

10) that declared war on us in 1979 when they seized our embassy and took hostages?

11) that is ruled by Islamist lunatics who want to provoke Armageddon because they believe it will produce the return of the “hidden Imam,” and lead to a new caliphate?

Yes.  It’s that very Iran.

Our elected representatives are resolute and incensed:

“Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., urged the administration to revisit a request by dozens of senators to target the country’s central bank, calling it the ‘paymasters’ for the Quds Force.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., called the plot an ‘outrage’ and called for increased sanctions against Iran.

[Senator Durbin has now, without question, cinched the title of the most-irony challenged politician of all time.  He’s calling for financial sanctions, which will have to be imposed through the cooperation of the very banks he first slammed with idiotic legislation, and then excoriated for implementing the completely predictable results of his ill-considered stupidity.]

Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, speaking on Fox News, called the plot an ‘act of war’ against the United States.

‘We have to do something,’ he said, saying the specifics of the response should be left up to the Defense Department and the president.”

And which serious steps commensurate with Iran’s actions against us since 1979 is the Obama Administration planning?

“But a senior Defense official told Fox News the announcement Tuesday “‘s not a trip wire for military action in Iran.’ ‘

‘No one should read into this as a pretense for any type of military response,” another senior Defense official added.

Speaking to Fox News on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the subject, the officials said the Pentagon sees the alleged plot as a criminal act that is rightly being handled by the Department of Justice. ”

“The Treasury Department said the other Quds officials named were also involved in the plot. The sanctions will freeze any U.S. assets held by the individuals and prohibit anyone in the U.S. from doing business with them.”

Mrs. Clinton is reported to be planning to speak with the Swiss Ambassador to Iran who will in turn likely present a strongly worded message to the Iranians on our behalf.

There are several possible scenarios at play.  With the Gunwalker debacle and the Solyandra scandal threatening to overwhelm the Obama Administration and absolutely devastate Mr. Obama’s already fast-failing re-election chances, it is not outside the realm of possibility that the Obama Administration is exaggerating the involvement of the highest levels of the Iranian regime, and Stratfor, the private intelligence firm, is suggesting just that, according to Fox.  However, Stratfor also notes that the Iranians have been conducting “preoperational surveillance,” in the US, but have not yet carried out a high profile attack.  Obamites would surely welcome the diversion of public attention from the alleged malfeasance and possible criminality of the Obama Administration, the Department of Justice, and a plethora of federal alphabet agencies.  As more and more damning evidence against the Administration and its allies becomes public, the Obama Administration must be desperate to escape scrutiny.

A lengthy civilian trial—the Obamite preferred vehicle for dealing with enemy combatants–of Iranian agents extending well into the election season could potentially help Mr. Obama burnish his anti-terrorist warrior credentials when even the Lamestream Media has taken to calling him isolated and withdrawn from the day to day performance of his duties.

But the possibility that the Iranians, emboldened by what they must surely believe to be the unlimited fecklessness of Mr. Obama, would embark on such a provocative course cannot be dismissed.  If Mr. Obama will take no obvious, affirmative steps to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons it has repeatedly sworn to put to immediate, genocidal use, why should the Iranians worry about Mr. Obama’s response to a much lesser provocation?  What will he do? Threaten to impose really serious sanctions by a date certain, and this time—unlike all the previous times–he really, really, pinky swear, double dog dare, means it?

What must the Iranians think of our response thus far?  We’re imposing sanctions on individual Iranian spies?  American firms won’t be able to do business with them?  Just how many Americans firms, pray tell, do a considerable portion of their business with Iranian operatives such that these sanctions will have any effect—other than provoking uproarious Iranian laughter—on Iran?  Will the threat of treating their spies as common criminals accorded the full protections of the Constitution the Iranians not only refuse to recognize but see as a sign of weakness strike fear into the hearts of the hardened terrorist murderers running that despotic nation?  Will it cause them to abandon their nuclear designs?  Beg for mercy and forgiveness from Israel?

At least Hillary Clinton knows the score.  Our own “Lady Of Jello” knows that Iran’s action “violates international norms.”  She recognizes that Iran represents a “clearer and clearer threat.”  She believes that working with other nations might “further isolate Iran.”  This is a parody—right?  Right?

On the international stage, Mr. Obama has made several noteworthy accomplishments.  One of the most remarkable has been making the French seem—compared to Mr. Obama–resolute defenders of freedom.  Another has been making it possible for fiscal basket case nations to lecture us on our economic policies. But the most truly noteworthy accomplishment of Barack Obama and his Administration has been the absolute transcendence of parody. Ironhawk?  The Onion?  Reality?  Who can say with certainty?  Who would wish to expend the effort?

It is not unreasonable to wonder if even a nuclear attack against Israel, American interests, or even America itself would provoke the Obama Administration to anything beyond strong language, a stirring invocation of the “international community” and “international norms,” criminal charges against individuals and sanctions which might “further isolate Iran.”

America—and the world—will be very fortunate indeed if our many enemies do not take advantage of what they must surely believe to be a historic opportunity between now and November of 2012.  On the other hand, with leadership that bows to despots, reflexively supports Marxist and Islamist despots and which actually delivers arms to our deadly enemies as a cynical and incredibly stupid means of imposing anti-freedom domestic policies, do we really need enemies?