NOVAK:   As Connie Chung reported, the Pentagon is moving senior military planners to a base in the Persian Gulf for a possible war with Iraq. But in an important shift in policy, the Bush administration now says it's willing to talk with North Korea before the North shuts down its nuclear weapons program. Stepping into the CROSSFIRE are Josh Marshall, contributing writer to Washington monthly, and Cliff May of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy. 
CARVILLE:   Let's Go, Cliff, right to the editor of "Newsweek International" and see what he had to say and give you a chance to comment. It kind of fits into Bobs lead in here. Soon the administration will turn to a version of the Clinton policy condemned. Officials have already told CNN that while they won't quote, "negotiate with North Korea," they could, well, quote "talk." I suppose it depends on the definition for the world negotiate is. For an administration that claims to know the definition of "is, " what's the difference between talk -- what is the definition of "is," by the way? 
MAY:   You guys haven't figured out? I think we need a whole program to discuss the definition of "is."    The real problem goes back, I'm afraid to 1994 when President Clinton under the urging of former President Carter struck a deal with North Korea... 
CARVILLE:   We can go back to 1994. First let's deal with 2003. What's the difference between talk and negotiate? 
MAY:   There is no good answer right now to the problem we have with North Korea. The lesson we've got to learn, once a thug, once a rogue dictator has nuclear weapons you don't have a simple solution. Look, I'm not going to tell you... 
CARVILLE:   You don't have a good answer for the difference between talk and negotiate so you're changing the subject. You're saying I don't have a good answer. 
MAY:   I think you may have to talk, you may have to negotiate. But what you don't want to do is appease, what you don't want to do is reward nuclear armed dictators and terrorists. 
CARVILLE:   We're going to talk to them before they -- that's a nice -- we're going to talk to them before they dismantle but we're not going to appease? I'm very vexed. 
MAY:   We don't have a good solution because for the last eight years we've allowed them to build nuclear weapons while we've given them fuel, oil...    And light water nuclear reactors. 
CARVILLE:   What do you want to say? 
MARSHALL:   Well, that's just not true. You are combining two different issues. One is the plutonium nuclear production plant that they have, and we put on ice in 1994. It was on ice until basically a few weeks ago. And then a uranium which we think started in 1999. 
MAY:   So what your saying -- let me understand what you're saying. 
MARSHALL:   Let me say what I'm saying. 
MAY:   Go ahead. 
MARSHALL:   Nothing's happened on the plutonium one. You're saying they've been making bombs. Everybody knows the uranium program is years away from making bombs. The plutonium is one is months away and now you guys have the plutonium thing back online. How is that better? 
MAY:   Your saying in 1994 we gave them fuel oil food and two nuclear reactors but we didn't really prohibit them from developing nuclear weapons which they were prohibited from developing under the nonproliferation agreement? 
NOVAK:   Can I just ask a simple factual question? 
MAY:   I'd love you to. 
NOVAK:   Isn't it true that when President Carter made the deal in 1994, the widespread impression was that this regime would not be around 10 years later? 
MARSHALL:   I think that's probably right. But I mean I'm not sure what the difference is? 
NOVAK:   They never thought that they would have to face the consequences of what they did in 1994 because they wouldn't be around. 
MARSHALL:   I think you're wrong. I don't think that's right. Look, the danger that we faced in 1994 was the fact the they were basically ready to go online, and become a plutonium factory. And they could proliferate it and do all sorts of stuff. We wanted to put that on ice and keep them in the international nuclear oversight program, and we did that. 
NOVAK:   Just a minute. We've been very, you know, I don't want to make this a moratorium on the Clinton administration. I'm really sick of talking about Clinton. Every time we get James next to me we have to talk about Clinton. I want to look at what President Bush said today, and you tell me whether this is not a reasonable approach. Let's listen to him. 
BUSH:   We have no aggressive intent. No argument with the North Korean people. We're interested in peace on the Korean peninsula. As we deal with the dangers of our time, different circumstances require different strategies. 
NOVAK:   Now, isn't that reasonable? 
MARSHALL:   It's reasonable but the only problem is it's completely different from what they've been doing for the last two years, so it's reasonable now. But how did they get us into this mess in the first place? 
MAY:   How did they get us into this mess? Look as recently as August they were keeping to the agreement made in 1994 pouring concrete on a light water nuclear power plant. Now, I'm not sure I would have been in favor of that but they were keeping to the agreement, but this agreement was violated. We were betrayed by the North Koreans. And, by the way, Paul Wolfowitz in 1995 said what are you guys doing with this agreement, they're going to violate it. And why was it an agreement not a treaty? Because Clinton did not want to submit it to the Congress for approval? Don't you think the president should consult with the Congress -- Jim. 
CARVILLE:   Let me got to a think here because apparently you're confused. Do you know -- I'm not going to try to give you a test, but do you understand the difference between plutonium and uranium? 
MAY:   I don't want... 
CARVILLE:   No, tell us the difference. 
MAY:   I don't want the North Koreans using anything to make nuclear weapons and neither should you. 
CARVILLE:   Would you explain to him -- because he doesn't understand. 
MAY:   A bomb made from plutonium and uranium, yes. 
MARSHALL:   There's a very big difference. One is several months away. The other is several years away. 
MAY:   Yes. 
MARSHALL:   And up until about a month ago, we had the plutonium still on ice, so basically now, you took us -- the people in this administration... 
CARVILLE:   Just a minute, Mr. Marshall. We've been through this. You're repeating yourself. You're both repeating yourself. Let me... 
MAY:   We don't want them to have any nuclear weapons in North Korea or Iraq, by the way. 
MARSHALL:   It's months or years. 
MAY:   Years is better. If they can make it for years that great. 
MARSHALL:   You took it from years to months. 
NOVAK:   Let me try as a reasonable person, lower the temperature here and let's listen to what the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency said yesterday. Let's listen to this. 
MOHAMMED EL BARADEI, DIRECTOR-GENERAL, IAEA:   The ball is very much in the court right now. I convey to them today the decision by our executive board, 35 members of unified view that North Korea has to come clean. We also told them that if you take the first step, we are ready to engage you into a dialogue. So the board is very much in accord. 
NOVAK:   So nobody wants to have a war on the Korean peninsula. That is a reasonable approach, is it not? 
MARSHALL:   I don't think most people do. But the Bush administration has been making threats back and forth the last two years. Ones that it's pretty clear they weren't going to be able to follow through on. 
MAY:   The last two years when they've been building a nuclear power plant for North Korea as recently as august. You tell me what threats they made a year ago? 
MARSHALL:   Putting in the axis of evil, giving all sorts of hints that regime change was our policy and not disarmament? Have you been paying attention -- 
MAY:   The idea that they're doing this because of something Bush said is nonsense. Secondly the reason they're being in the axis of evil...    Let me finish. Because they're wrong if they do. Secondly, the reason he put them in the axis of evil is because they all knew through intelligence sources that the agreements not to build nuclear weapons were being violated. They knew it at that time he said that. I talked to the administration at that time. 
CARVILLE:   Let me read you something. We know why they put them in the axis of evil. Let's listen here. Put it up there. One thing about coming here we can always inform you. 
MAY:   It's wonderful that you do that, James. 
CARVILLE:   And not a completely crazy case can be made the most influential thinker in foreign policy apparatus in the administration of George W. Bush, the first two years was not of -- was not Cheney, Rumsfeld, not Condi, not Rummy, not any of these people. Not Tenet, not Wolfowitz, but rather a 42-year-old Canadian named David Frum, who is a speech writer who in his book said, no one ever tells anything about North Korea. He just -- he needed three things to match so that's how it came out of his mouth. 
MAY:   James... 
CARVILLE:   So we are now running a foreign policy by speech writers. 
MAY:   The quick answer is this. When that happened I called someone in the administration. I said, Did you put North Korea in the axis of evil just so you wouldn't only have Muslim nations? And they said, No, you're going to find out why very soon. 
NOVAK:   The last word for you. 
MAY:   Glad to have it. 
NOVAK:   Thanks. 
MAY:   Always a pleasure to see you and be educated. 
NOVAK:   Coming up in "Fireback" one of our viewers wants to know just who's really afraid of presidential wanna-be Al Sharpton. But next, a complaint that TV is frivolous, demeaning, and reinforces stereotypes. Now really is that anything new?
