if the vice president were to help forge that kind of diplomacy, that it doesn't look, you know, strong enough, you know, from the president's point of view, after all that saber rattling and, you know, harsh talk? >> it's a great question, fred. i think what it reflects is their own interstaff, interagency tensions over north korea. i think the nsc under mcmaster and the president are more bullish about where to go with north korea. the state department and the pentagon are really trying hard to find a diplomatic path forward, trying to find some sort of channel of communications. and i think what you see out of the vice president, sort of unbalanced behavior, is reflective of this inner agency tension. that's really unfortunate. because up until very recently, and the president's tweets notwithstanding, the national security team has done a pretty good job getting china to the table, enacting more sanctions, putting pressure on the north. i agree, there's some degree the