“Mark my words.  It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. We’re about to elect a brilliant 47-year-old senator president of the United States of America. Remember I said it standing here if you don’t remember anything else I said. Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy.”

For all of his gaffes, Joe Biden just might have been right.  After testing a nuclear bomb underground over the weekend, North Korea has now test-launched two short range missiles, introducing what might be the crisis that Big Joe was referring to.  Of course, the President has not exactly been short on “tests” in his first four months in office.  Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Iran, and Somali pirates constitute quite the international plateful for a newly elected president. But nuclear tests by whackjob regimes are basically per se global crises.

As of now, the President has limited his response to labeling the North Korean action as “a grave threat.“  While some would have wanted a stronger choice of words, this seems like a sufficient first step.  But, at the end of the day, North Korea is likely not a very big test for President Obama anyway.  The international community is virtually unanimous in its condemnation of Kim Jong Il’s conduct.  Even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came out and condemned the dictator.  Thus, it’ll likely be easy to get the world to speak in one voice against North Korea and to place sufficient pressure on Kim Jong Il to cease his activity.

Moreover, Kim Jong Il (or Lil’ Kim, as Bill Maher likes to call him) might be the most paranoid person on the planet.  All he cares about is the security of his regime and, arguably, improved conditions for his people (We all know they need it.  Take a look at this image – North Korea is the dark spot sandwiched between South Korea and China).  He has no global ambitions – his interests are purely inward looking and the last thing he would want to do is fire a nuclear weapon.  However, he would love to use the weapon as a bargaining chip for international aid to be pumped into the country.

Of course, it seems like a problematic precedent to legitimize the development of nuclear weapons in return for aid.  But North Korea is an example unique to North Korea.  Considering the country’s limited, perhaps even less threatening, intentions, the President would be wise to engage in the policy of negotiation that both Clinton and (eventually) Bush adopted.  Notwithstanding the extreme unlikelihood that North Korea would actually fire a nuclear weapon, I think we would rather keep the Korean peninsula from going nuclear.  If that goal can be bought with aid, so be it.

The administration could also spin such a result as the product of some of the diplomatic idealism that got Barack Obama elected.

In 1965, the Democrats had a 68-32 advantage in the Senate and LBJ as president. Within four years, Nixon was president.

In 1977, the Democrats had a 61-39 advantage in the Senate and Carter as president. Within four years, Reagan was president.

Question: Is today like 1965 and 1977, and conditions exist for another GOP comeback? Or are things different? (And if so, how and why? Luck? Bad governing? Dynamic candidate?)

My thoughts on this question: Barack Obama seems like a more dynamic candidate than either LBJ or JC.  But I don’t think that will be enough to save him and the democrats if his policies aren’t perceived as successful.  There is a fundamental ideological divide in this country that the stimulus bill has exacerbated.  If, three years from now, history shows that the stimulus was full of airports to nowhere, he might lose some key support.  To this end, Obama’s “stimulus cop,” Vice President Joe Biden, was quoted on the phone with a stimulus recipient on Sunday’s episode of 60 Minutes as saying, “But don’t come back and tell me you built a swimming pool because it doesn’t pass the smell test.”  Hopefully Joe’s tough talk works.  And hopefully the Biden “smell test” isn’t the only weapon in the administration’s arsenal.

But what’s clear is that Republicans have gone back to their small government roots in an effort to distinguish themselves from the administration’s policies.  This new/old platform could strike a chord with voters depending on how things work out.  Obama’s fate is thus intertwined with the perception of the stimulus, the state of the economy, and any other spontaneous and intervening variable that this world has so often proved capable of producing.