Ouch.

WASHINGTON, March 15 (UPI) — Washington sends a message that Americans are “oil-sucking hypocrites” without backing a no-fly zone over Libya, families of Lockerbie bombing victims say.

U.S. President Barack Obama said last week Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi is on the “wrong side of history.” Pentagon officials and top U.S. lawmakers are reluctant to back a no-fly zone for Libya, however, equating it to an act of war.

Family members of the victims of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 said oil companies have invested billions of dollars in Libya since U.S. sanctions were lifted five years ago.

“Oil interests therefore have a financial interest to let Gadhafi stay in power,” they claim. . . .

“If the U.S. does not act and Gadhafi wins, the U.S. will have restored an old enemy and sent a message to all democratic forces in oppressive regimes that we are indeed feckless, unreliable, oil sucking hypocrites,” stated Paul Hudson, father of a Lockerbie victim and co-president of the Families of Pan Am 103/Lockerbie.