President Trump was left smarting from third-degree Twitter burns on Sunday, inflicted by a senior senator of his own party.



But Tennessee Republican Bob Corker's dark quip, doubling down on his earlier observation that Trump's national security team provides him with badly-needed adult supervision, wasn't just funny. It was chilling.



Because this isn't just another tweet-war. As Corker, head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, clearly recognizes, we're facing the real thing.

It's a shame the White House has become an adult day care center. Someone obviously missed their shift this morning. — Senator Bob Corker (@SenBobCorker) October 8, 2017

Will he and other top GOPers guiding our foreign policy - who've now called Trump a "moron" and the White House an "adult day care center" - take real, substantive steps to contain him?



As Corker confirms, it's not just Democrats who believe we are being held hostage by an erratic narcissist. So do many Republican senators and top Trump advisors, who see their ability to manage and talk him down as essential to our safety.



Consider Trump's actions on North Korea. He has personally insulted an unstable man; undertaken no significant diplomatic push with China, Japan or South Korea; and publicly undermined his own secretary of state - leaving our adversaries wondering why they're even wasting time speaking to him.

Gregory Treverton, intelligence stalwart, addresses the North Korean powderkeg



He has harshly criticized our key ally, South Korea; ensured Kim Jong Un feels as imperiled as possible by warning of fire and fury, then threatened and sanctioned Iran after it did basically what we need North Korea to do - curbed its nuclear activities.



Ask yourself: Why would Kim give up weapons in that circumstance? He'd be crazy to.

Which is why Corker warns that as long as Trump continues to treat his office "like a reality show," his reckless threats toward other countries could set the nation "on the path to World War III."



It echoes what Gregory Treverton, a veteran White House foreign policy advisor, told us just last week: For Trump, "it's all about him. Language is all about effect and not content. He tries to sound tough or portray himself as an expert, yet it's underscored by an enormous ignorance."



Corker, one of the many who have tried to tutor Trump on foreign affairs, was wrong to support his candidacy in 2016. But at least he has enough gumption now to essentially call him out as unfit. The Republican response to this?

Not that it isn't true. Just that the senator is retiring, so can express his honest opinions.

The Trump policy toward North Korea is largely irrational | Editorial



"A lot of people think that there is some kind of 'good cop, bad cop' act underway, but that's just not true," Corker told the New York Times, adding that Trump has hurt the U.S. in negotiations with his careless tweets.

The question now is, what is Corker going to do about it?



As chairman of the foreign relations committee, there are ways he could check Trump's dangerous behavior. He could draft legislation to sharpen our standards for committing troops to war.

He could hold hearings, much like one of his predecessors, J. William Fulbright, did in 1966, over his fellow Democrat Lyndon Johnson's mishandling of Vietnam, James Fallows points out in The Atlantic.



Above all, Corker and fellow Republicans must re-focus the public on the real threat we face.

Respect for our military isn't ordering your vice president to spend taxpayer dollars on a flight to a football game, just to stage a publicity stunt to rally your base - as Mike Pence did Sunday, walking out when players predictably kneeled during the national anthem.



It's remembering that when you recklessly name-call our adversaries for the sake of showmanship, or shun our closest allies, you put more than a million of our active-duty military personnel at risk; not to mention every single American.

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