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Let's see here. Helen.

Q I have a follow-up --

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I have a list. (Laughter.) I don't want to be so discriminatory that people will say that I haven't thought this through. After all, the new arrangement -- and by the way, we're here in honor of Ari Fleischer; otherwise we'd be in his house. But since he's getting married this weekend, I thought it appropriate to leave the podium that he occupies empty, in honor of the fact that he's getting married. I hope you all have sent your gifts to him. (Laughter.)

Ari, I did what you asked me to do. (Laughter. I'm sure he's on C-SPAN right now.

Helen.

Q Mr. President, what is the logic of your insistence on invading Iraq at some point, which may someday have nuclear weapons, and not laying a glove on North Korea, which may have them or may produce them? Both of which, of course, would be against international law. And I have a follow-up. (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I may decide to let you have that follow-up or not depending upon -- (laughter) -- depending on whether I like my answer. (Laughter.)

I am insistent upon one thing about Iraq, and that is that Saddam Hussein disarm. That's what I'm insistent on. He agreed to do that, by the way. Saddam Hussein said he would disarm. And he hasn't. And for the --

Q And you don't --

THE PRESIDENT: Is that the follow-up? (Laughter.) Okay, that is the follow-up. I do care about North Korea. And as I said from the beginning of this new war in the 21st century, we'll deal with each threat differently. Each threat requires a different type of response. You've heard my strategy on dealing with Iraq. I've been very clear on dealing with the strategy all along, and tomorrow it looks like part of that strategy is coming to fruition.

With North Korea, we're taking a different strategy, initially, and it's this -- that we're going to work with countries in the neighborhood to convince North Korea that it is not in the world's interest that they develop a nuclear weapon through highly enriched uranium.

We know they've got the capacity through plutonium; we have IAEA inspectors there watching carefully their plutonium stockpile. And then we discovered that, contrary to an agreement they had with the United States, they're enriching uranium, with the desire of developing a weapon. They admitted to this. And so, therefore, we have worked with our Japanese friends and South Korean friends, with the leadership in China -- I will talk with Vladimir Putin about this after my trip to the NATO summit -- to remind North Korea that if they expect to be a -- welcomed into this family of peaceful nations, that they should not enrich uranium.

I thought it was a very interesting statement that Jiang Zemin made in Crawford, where he declared very clearly that he wants a nuclear weapons-free Korean Peninsula. That was, in my judgment, an important clarification of Chinese policy that I hope the North Koreans listen to. Believe we can achieve this objective, Helen, by working closely with this consortium of nations, which have got a valid interest in seeing to it that North Korea does not have nuclear weapons.

I think Bush was a bit miffed at Helen interrupting him.

Q And you don't --

THE PRESIDENT: Is that the follow-up? (Laughter.) Okay, that is the follow-up.

Helen Thomas makes me sick. She's not only liberal, she's down right rude, nasty and shockingly unphotogenic (to say the least! :)

Can't she let our president bask in our victory for just one day???