sticks, carrots, and elmer fudd

Josh Marshall writes about William Perry on North Korea:

The Bushies claim that the Clinton policy was all carrots and no sticks. Not true when you consider we threatened war over the plutonium issue in 1994 -- and like all effective threats of force, it succeeded in getting the North Koreans to sit down and negotiate. But the Bush policy has been no carrots and no sticks. President Bush won't tolerate a nuclear North Korea. But he won't do anything about it either. Clearly, in Bushspeak 'won't tolerate' just means some high politics equivalent of 'I'll be vewwy, vewwy mad.'

UPDATE: Fred Kaplan in Slate lays out the details. (link via GITM)