tv Charlie Rose Bloomberg May 19, 2014 8:00pm-9:01pm EDT
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then e-mail, they said departure was related to an issue with management in the newsroom. while theysome -- are not talking to the press both have a peer to on program in previous years. she told me about her interview for her position with the publisher. >> i was nervous. i picked at my food. >> what did he want to know? >> he wanted to know first of all things about what my vision of where the news report needed to go and he wanted to discuss both some of my strengths and some weaknesses. >> an appraisal of drinks and weaknesses. >> i thought that was fair.
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>> what did he say? canhen i am in a bad mood i be too brusque with people and you can read it on my face that who iss like good jill still at it and engaged in wants to talk about a great story and who compliments reporters, that is good jill. and bad jill can interact and be bad. she has to work on listening. she does. >> she told me what distinguishes the "new york od journalism. >> this is what distinguishes as quality journalism. we do it in the print as print journalism and digitally by the hour. we deepen stories by ringing
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readers into the conversation. you and live in the story and add new dimensions to it. am -- investedy in our digital work. we used to talk at the times, even arthur would use the phrase we have to be ready for our digital future. it is not the digital future. it is the digital president. digital president. we have a newspaper that is treasured by hundreds of thousands of readers. we have more people who home new york to "the times" in print now than we did. we have a very dedicated core of people who enjoy the news report most in print. we are going to keep delivering it that way to them. they love that. >> and here is the publisher in
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2005 on the importance of choosing the right leadership for his paper. >> what i think is critical for me to say is that it is my job more than anything, it is my job to ensure that when the time comes for the next generation of leaders to take over the news for brent company that they are strong andandid as powerful and institution as i did in my time. >> he is the first african it american editor. tracking the story from the beginning. why are we so fascinated, people in the media like you and i obviously observed by it but it seems to be the talk everywhere. yorker" got one
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million hits which is extraordinary. did.for the first one i as does myto me e-mail and my phone calls the tremendous amount of interest in this and some of it i think is woman. the sense that the first female was she fired and is it true that her compensation, her pay was less than her male -- the person she succeeded was male. >> one of the crucial issues, i want to set that aside first. staying with the management issues. >> that is it. feeds into a larger context of management. >> what was the management issue, that seems so severe that the publisher did not think he could work it out or make it eligible. arthurot forget
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r. appointed hal raines. they won multiple pulitzer prizes. he was one of the greatest editors but he had a very difficult management style. he was ruskin he was brutal -- brusque and he was brutal. arthur had to fire him. he debated whether to make editor,amson the next the debate was he worried that jill abramson was too much like hal in some ways, she was too rough. not as rough as hell. she had a brusque reputation. he worried about that. he decided that she had the
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experience, she was tough and she had the digital experience lacked and he chose her. they had a good relationship for a period of time. they heard feedback that she was rusk with people in the newsroom existed.tension >> because of? >> all kinds of things. she was very wary of the new ceo mark thompson coming into the newsroom. high wall between the news side and the business side. job was to fix digital. >> and to figure out new ways of generating revenue. all newspapers are in trouble. the business side once those walls lowered was to figure out some ways to make more money. a traditional journalist and jill abramson is a good
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journalist worries. something called native advertising comes to the fore. s" embraces.ime it is saying to corporations, we will camouflage your ads to make them look like new stories. -- news stories. other online news publications that do the same thing. your asking questions of mark thompson on the business side. ee that our circulation is going down and our advertising is going down and that creates the tension. on top of that, jill abramson discovered several weeks ago that her pay is less than the person she succeeded, bill keller. >> how did she discover this? >> i know but i cannot say.
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i would betray a source but she finds out and she finds out that she is getting paid less. was 559l keller hers thousand. she goes to the publisher and mark thompson and complaints and she finds out, same source, that her pay when she was managing it wasless than the male that the managing editor. when she was washington bureau chief her pay was lower. >> is there any explanation, the salary was less. >> there are always explanations. editorialto be on the or danny had a higher rate of pay so he was making more money. salary carried over. there is not a good explanation for why the salary --
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theyu would think that would say we cannot afford to to a woman as editor that is less than a man. but then what happens, here's where the complications begin. says when you compare salary, you have to look at total compensation. statement the a next day saying that total compensation was roughly comparable. they did not answer the question about the managing editor, by the way. and how is that? they say it is because you have to look at the bonuses and the stock options and any other long-term payments. but they did agree to bump up to 520 $5,000 after she protested. she didn't -- she hired a lawyer
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to talk to them and work this out in the saw this as a warlike action. >> a declaration of war. l is toobecame jil difficult to work with. that fit that storyline that was developing. >> it brought it to -- happened. thing they all agreed that they should hire a digital managing editor to be the counterpart. >> who is they? somet just jill labor and -- abramson and mark thompson. arrangedened was they janine gibson to come in a week ago last monday to meet with arthur and thompson and the go
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to lunch. they were trying to recruit her. wasdid not tell dean she recruiting to be a managing editor but doing digital. upset.really so he happened to have a dinner with arthur sulzberger is the following wednesday, tuesday -- two days later. didat dinner, dean something very uncharacteristic. he is very gentle and a popular figure and a good journalist. he said it is unacceptable that this happened this way and the fact that jill is very difficult to work with, i find. arthur was confronted with the question, this fit into that sense that jill was too
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difficult and it was not a team that he felt calm but with. jill to hise asked office and fired her. he said would you like to announce your resigning? tell the truth. thing aboute more the pay which i think is important? it doesn't matter whether you double over how many dollars difference there wasn't pay it even if you assume that they were right that the total compensation was comparable, the fact that the first female editor believed it was not comparable, believed that she was not getting paid equally for equal work is something the times not to address. and that is an issue that led her to hire a lawyer. >> do you think the publisher
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thought that he should not pay her as much for the same job some -- because of gender? >> i do not believe that her one minute -- 41 minute. -- for one minute. his mind?s in >> because of the economy and the decline of the newspapers we have to reduce the salary. it could be that they are justifying that keller had in at the times for a longer period. they are saying they made it equal. on the other hand if they said they made it equal, why did they agree after she protested to raise or pay from 503-2525? -- 503 to 525? had said, weson want to keep you here forever.
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this is on april 28 and an e-mail which i published to her talking he said she was about jenin abram -- to janine trying to recruit her. and about jill as you point out. what he said in the e-mail was jenin adores you, she respects you. the way that -- to close the deal and get her here is to reassure her that you will stay for a long period of time as the editor which i hope you will do. 10 days later she is fired. >> do you think they will be affected by this in the following way, she was a magnet for young women who are reporters. business,omestic, science, politics. will that change? >> i do not know. i know that one of the things and arthur did
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yesterday was gore around and meet with women to assure them. he is great at that. normally when an editor is replaced, people are full of anxiety. etc., who my job, will come in? when they look at dean they are comfortable. wondered if the president of the united states did not know that he had david traced to go over there, would this have happened if the publisher did not know that he had dean to go to? >> that is an important point. clearly he did. that was -- he knew that would so things down. >> what are you looking for, where is your reporter's i searching -- eye search?
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>> one is what impact will this have? in the business world they talk about the brand. for does "the times" stand and the fear is that this will harm the brand. maybe they will loose some women. >>-- lose some women. >> it is important not to be unfair. arthur sulzberger who you can fault for the the way he has run the business side of the paper, it is not in great business shape. journalistically it is in very good shape. his is part of responsibility, too. he chose the first female editor. the notion that he somehow is sexist is kind of preposterous. >> thank you. >> my pleasure. now continue our
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conversation about leadership at "the new york times." my guest is the former editor of "the chicago tribune." from washington, dylan byers and rebecca traister. me the issues in this much discussed firing. >> it is a sign of issues around jill and what happened and that has been much discussed in much -- and much reported and probably much more to come. i think for me and for many of the people i have been speaking with and hearing from in the last several days, there is this looming question about where women stand in this industry. when i became editor of the chicago tribune in 2001, there were quite a number of us and the growing number of us who were holding the seniormost
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leadership positions in newsrooms. we used to have a dinner once a year and we could fill a dinner table of those of us who were doing this work and were now with jill's dismissal we have no women leading any newspapers in the top 10 markets and in the two.5, we have only therink this question of whi women in journalism is a story of a lot of regression in recent years. i do think that we placed a man's -- demands on women in these roles that we may not even be consciously aware of but this balance to be coming you need to ,e assertive but not aggressive you need to be strong but not too strong, you need to be human but not motherly, and i think
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that is a really tough balance and when someone does not play that kind of pre-prescribed role and is seen as some of the language we are hearing, abrasive, bossi, i think it creates a challenge for that woman to succeed. >> that is an issue into itself. think arthuro you sulzberger would not have fired a man in the same circumstances aced on what appeared to be the issues"?nt have a lot of respect for arthur and he runs a very accomplished company. the work that they do is extraordinary and he deserves some credit for that. with or not he would have done something different in the case of a male editor, i have no
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insight into that. i do think that if you look at just apart from jill's case, any of these cases with women succeeding in their jobs and somehow failing, you do have to ask questions about, was there mentoring, was their support, was their guidance when they were fishers or fault lines that were identified in someone's performance and i think that is a question for the times as it has been for any of these women. i had that at the tribune. i was extraordinarily fortunate. there's not a lot of training for these jobs. it is certified the job training. you are appointed editor and you are responsible for this massive institution and if you do not have the scaffolding, the kind of human scaffolding in place at the highest echelons of the company, it will be much harder to succeed. not know yetwe do all of the various management issues that will be reported
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eventually within the next few days. and all of the specifics about why arthur sulzberger decided to fire jill abramson but if we're talking about the way her manner was hair dries, in the press and by sources who spoke to dylan byers in the story, she has been characterized as being brusque, short tempered, scolding staff, very short with the photo editor was -- that was in dylan''s in my 13. why are you still in this meeting, go fix the photo. there is a long and storied history of executive editors, editors, editors everywhere, bosses everywhere in high-powered positions being ill tempered, staff having complaints about their management style. help raines was a famously terrible, abrasive manager who employees said rule the newsroom
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by fear. >> it probably contributed to his downfall. >> it did. what did him and was a very andific error and scandal that he was publishing reporting that it turned out had been fabricated by his reporter. >> this had nothing to do with jill posthumus in. >> apparently. in not offering the specifics, if he had provided a rundown of the reasons that he fired jill abramson we might have a clearer version. heknew with raines, exhibited many of the same qualities that have been reported about abramson. the newsroom did not like him. he had lost the newsroom. abramson herself may have had to do the optics, she may have chosen not to be there. it has been reported that she chose to be fired rather than resign. senyet arthur sulzberger's nof to her had
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acknowledgment of her accomplishments as an editor. whether was diversifying the masthead or for individual achievements, the snowfall story that got so much attention and prizes, the series about the homeless adolescent. there was no rundown of her occult bushmen's or acknowledgment of her historic role and it is sent out. in terms of how we talk about management styles, she and raines are comparable. it reason gender comes into is we are accustomed to the idea of men in power being unpleasant in many ways. to does not mean we like them or liked working for them. we may think they're terrible managers but it does not strike as a reason toy, disqualify them from their powerful position. our ears are not tuned to women exhibiting the same kinds of
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professional power and attitudes. and so that strikes people who work for them, people who are their bosses, people who read about them, it hits a strong. all of us. woman, men, their subordinates, their superiors. we are not used to those attitudes and that kind of voice coming from a woman so we respond to it differently. to that last point i think there are always questions to be raised about differences in how we treat women in power versus minimum power. certainly there is a different attitude towards a woman if she is brusque and a man if he is brusque. those have been well documented or explored over the last 48 hours. i would say that there are things that happened behind-the-scenes the scenes that we know about from our reporting and they do not amount to overseeing a jayson which -- ascenario
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fireable offense. than are larger scenes just someone who is colder difficult to do with. she didn't make moves to hire a co-managing editor without telling her current managing editor. she hired a lawyer to address her concerns about her salary. combativeiewed as a move by the publisher, arthur sulzberger. i do think that the question of sexism is a fair one to explore. i would add that it is not simply due to her attitude in page-one meetings. >> would this have happened if there was no -- someone as over,, prepared to take who clearly had himself some conflict with jill according to what we read and someone that the paper valued as a future
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editor and probably jill thought of as a future editor-in-chief. >> certainly. having dean who is executive editor in that position created some new pressures. he was trying to be coached by other news organizations and that might have played in to this as well. jillwe know is that abramson did not have a great relationship with our thistles burger. -- arthur. there are areas where they butted heads as well. when you have that dynamic owing on, added to some of these moves up that i mentioned behind the scenes, maybe behind peoples back added to a general frustration with her management style, with that sort of brusque ness. hard for the publisher not to look at dean mckay and to
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look at the newsroom and said that it is time for change which is what he said to jill abramson when he informed her he knew to make that move. >> is there any news in time -- in terms of what kind of settlement there is, and what they agreed to do and not do? rex there is a non-disparagement agreement. the two organizations, the parties cannot talk about the terms of her termination which makes things very comp gated. at the same time we are seeing salary figures about her celly versus other people's salary coming out and the reporting which works well for abramson and her defenders trade we are seeing leaked memos, i have reported on a leaked memo this afternoon coming out of the "new york times." there is a proxy war being played here between the two parties as a way to address an
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issue that they are contractually obligated not to address in public area >> it should be pointed out because you have heard this time after time since this story broke that jill was enormously popular with times.an -- women at the she was viewed with -- as a role model. >> not universally. they were women who had trouble with her. there has been some good reporting on how especially some of the younger men at the paper, she really took time to mentor them and to set an example for them. she promoted a lot of women. she put a lot of women at the head of sections that had not been the case before. she made the masthead almost half female unprecedented in a male-dominated institution. think there are a lot of women who were shocked by this.
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both woman working with her and had trouble working with her. one of the things dan was talking about was how few women there are at the top. one of the problems when you have a possibly of women, those who are there come to mean so much, they come to represent more -- so much. if there were more of them he would not care as much when one of them got hired or fired. a lot of women and men sort of put a lot of meaning on jill's leadership. something similar will be true .or dean mckay when you have people who have been shut out of these positions power and there are a few of them who attain them, they mean a lot. >> there was some celebration that she rose to this position coming off of being a washington bureau chief. >> tremendous. she had and has a remarkable career. >> they were praised because they hired the first woman editor. >> yes. a little late but yes.
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>> at the time. thewhen you look at compensation issue, i talked to -- kento -- can a letter auletta about it. how do you get around the issue of equal pay for equal work? >> we know from industry perspective that woman -- women are earning about 83% in the journalism industry from the median there is for men for similar jobs and women represent which5% of most newsrooms is almost identical to where it was 15 years ago. thisyou have at -- is small group of women who know the national statistics and particularly when you are at the you you do not -- who are
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going to ask and who are you going to compare this to? there is this sense that nationally and in this industry, the question is going to occur to you, am i being paid, am i being compensated, am i being treated as my predecessor was or as my successor will be? you cannot live with the statistics your entire working life which jill would have as a woman growing up in this industry and not at some point asked the question, am i being fairly compensated? i do not think it is unusual to wonder that. i do not know how she articulated that. her lawyer.r or >> or her attorney. the general context in which she would be operating is one that would certainly underscore the possibility that perhaps you were paid less than your predecessor. >> what do you know about this,
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bill? >> i would like to say there is -- it is impossible to look at the data and not accept the fact that women are paid less than men for the same positions. that is a fact and it is an unfortunate fact. it is important to remember that there is not a set salary for certain positions. salaries are something you build over time through your experience at a news organization and you get other offers any comeback engaged counteroffers and you build that salary over time. we do know is that her predecessor was making, ken auletta has the exact figures. jill had to sort of fight her way in order to dump her salary up into the low 500 thousands and just a little bit closer to 500 and a quarter. by granting her that salary, there is a little bit of acknowledgment that she deserved to be making more than she was.
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>> i want to respond to that in a couple of different ways. first when it comes to issues of equal pay there are always reasons to justify unequal pay and some are very real. it is about seniority, how you negotiate. those are eerie real but those are the kinds of reasons that are always offered to contextualize why women are always paid less than men. they work fewer hours. there are structural reasons why women work furor -- fewer hours. these issues are complicated. it does not make it less real. on the other hand that is always the context that is brought out to justify unequal pay. >> you're right and i think it is -- it is important to get there on the record for your viewers. her salary was lower, we do know a memoe times, there is of the ceo to a small group of his colleagues assuring them that her total compensation package was bigger and i gets
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into a whole sort of muddled area about different issues like bonuses and things like that. >> the times has been having a good year reasonably. next she has presided over a time of pretty good financial growth. the other thing i wanted to mention is the story of her fight to bump it up closer to what keller was making is fascinating to me because you mentioned how excited they were and how eager it was to herald its first female executive editor. you would speak -- think this speaks to the poor management we have seen on display this week. you would think that when it comes to common sense and what they should understand about issues of equal pay and given that it knows it has a historic figure running its paper that as soon as the first woman executive editor comes to management and says, i am concerned about equal pay, you would not think this would have
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to be a fight. perspective, pr why do they not say, that is a problem, we have to bump her up? >> and when you hire her say that we want to be [inaudible] deep problems to a in their misunderstanding of these issues. >> it speaks to a deep problem with the way that they handled the er surrounding this and the optics in general. that arthur know is sulzberger wanted to have abramson at the meeting where he handed over power to dean mckay. he wanted to have a more graceful exit. she said i will not fake it. >> it is important to say also served inwas not well that transition. he is an extraordinarily accomplished journalist and a terrific manager. very well-liked at the times. i worked with him as a in chicago.
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and to have this other historic moment the clouded by her exit which as rebecca says you have to anticipate. used thesuch -- you word celebration when she was named as editor. the disappointment is in proportion to what the anebration was and this is historic moment for the times and for dean personally and i would have wished him a better inaugural moment. >> think you very much -- thank you very much. we will be right back. stay with us. ♪
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>> thank you ray much. >> let's start with france. tell me about francois hollande and you get the sense that with this extraordinary low approval of the numbers that they are we thinking what he wants to he end u.s. president. >> two things. he said recently, he made a very surprising statement. he said that he understands that he has not been elected for himself but he was elected because people voted against sarkozy. the fact that he says it is quite impressive. the problem is that the french socialist party has evolved these last two years. it is still divided. the three modern social democratic wing.
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there is also the leftist wing idolatries ofthe the past. it is difficult for him to have the maturity to conduct the reforms that we need to do. knowing news is that france, there is recognition that those reforms have to be done. it is a bit slow. >> has he changed his mind set about what is necessary in terms has a heavy dose of stateism. >> yes. is understanding a lot of things. when you can talk with him in private or a small group you can see that he understands quite well what the situation is created the situation is more political. not -- has not been in
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trouble to the same point as italy was, for instance or spain or greece. sometimes it is more difficult to do reforms when you're not forced to do them. thanis more about politics economics. >> it is -- the foreign policy seems to be activist. ofin fact there is a lot continuity with sarkozy. involved in the .usiness of foreign policy the french-american relationships are cyclical. timetime it is a very good compared, for instance, with 2003, the situation at the time
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of the iraqi invasion. the remarkable thing is that sarkozy and francois hollande, i do not see much difference between the two. i do not see much difference. they're very much pro-american. ofthink of the example durant. i would say that we have been perhaps even more tougher ---à-vis iran than the them then the americans. >> do you think they will make an agreement? >> yes, for two reasons. one is that the iranians have -- badly needs the agreement. if there is one it might be his clear success in foreign
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policy. the real question is will that agreement be a good one, particularly in terms of nuclear issues and the risk is that the position in error and is not so strong. the worst-case scenario would be that he will be overturned in air and. it is not totally impossible. element in a strong the body politic of durant. -- iran. ronnie -- rouhani. >> the election has been well in the sense -- all the
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were rejectedtes by the population because the regime is not popular today. acceptable wass rouhani. notide experts did understand it. conservatives are still very much of their. and holds some strong positions. nevertheless, my bet is that there will be an agreement and that will change potentially the whole situation in the middle east. >> because they will agree to reduce their interest there were ?ny and -- uranium in the end
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will find some face-saving device to do so. fundamentally what do they want? it is a little bit like russia. they want to save the regime. regime is condemned in the long term. there are several ways to die, so to speak. the question is not to die too quickly. that is the fundamental objective of the regime. >> and then there is ukraine. is theportive ofernments of -- government tougher sanctions? >> first of all it is important to understand where we are and why we are here. i think we did not clearly
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russiansd that for the ukraine is in their own minds, especially the eastern part of ukraine is part of russia. that is the way they look at it. we may disagree them a we might say -- it is a fact. i think we made big mistakes with the idea that ukraine could be a member of nato. said explicitly. >> so when was that? >> i think it was in 2008. >> least to say that about georgia. >> of course the georgia thing. first editionthe of my conference, that didn't influence one of the guests. hasade his speech which
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been referred to where he proposed an updating of the helsinki conference. now known as the osce. the west did not react to that proposal. i think it is not too late. we need some updating. also we have been, we the west have been inconsistent in my judgment to recognize kosovo as an independent state. to russiaopen the way . and even libyan thing. the responsibility to protect [indiscernible] was used wrongly. putin in crimea.
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i think sanctions, yes. it would be better to look positively of what they can do be the crucial element would the constitution of ukraine. there will have to be a federal solution, not necessarily the way that putin is talking about it. we can update the security situation in europe. sanctions, yes, but we have to be very careful. the mood is extremely nationalistic in russia. we need also russia for the red deal. and syria as well. potentially also parts of the world. korea and who knows. >> what do wants?nk putin
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is mesmerized by the orange revolution. therefore for him the short-term stability inintain russia. is fundamentally [indiscernible] some people say he is a strategist. it depends on how you define that. he fundamentally thinks that andia has been humiliated today the problem is [indiscernible] the greater judgment as that there are probably very few
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people who can talk to him frankly and openly and his own neighborhood. when these things happen they become dangerous because they become too self-confident and autocratic. because there is too much self-confident. he is extremely intelligent. he knows a good technocrat. knowsws the details, he everything in the details. but judgment is the key issue. i am afraid he might be too much isolated. >> what do you think most of the european countries and most of our friends in asia and latin america and in africa want from the united states? that most am not sure you could talk to on the subject could answer
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properly your question. they expect,what bey would like the u.s. to the leader. at the same time, they would complain further reasons. that the u.s. remains by far the number one country in the world. maybe the problem is again, a problem of cycles. between tooillates much interventionism and too little. after george w bush activism, the pendulum is switching in the opposite direction. "action and reaction in the world
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situation." you use the word respect. west,country expects the particularly the u.s. to respect them. mentioned an interesting conversation with a high chinese authority. whether china was for. role ina constructive the government system. this was his answer. he said number one, this is not in our tradition. number two, we understand that we must clear role and we will do our best to do it. under one condition. what is that condition? you must respect us. >> thank you. the book is called "a
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>> this is "taking stock" for monday, may 19, 2014. i am pimm fox. today's theme is the good and bad side of innovation. first the bad. the u.s. accuses five chinese military officials of stealing trade secrets through the use of cyber-espionage. you will learn about the alleged hacker attacks, and now to the good. innovation can bring fitness classes into your living room. and
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