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tv   Fareed Zakaria GPS  CNN  March 25, 2018 7:00am-8:00am PDT

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at&t, not so much. we give you 75 mbps for $59.95. that's more speed than at&t's comparable bundle, for less. call today. winston churchill famously said of russia, it is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an e em enig enigma. prime minister churchill, meet vladimir putin. he is really very much of a leader. he has been leader far more than our president has been a leader. >> he was a kgb agent. he doesn't have a soul. >> vladimir putin is a thug, and a murderer and a killer. >> he is the richest man in the
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world. hundreds of billions of dollars in wealth. >> what does he want from donald trump? >> putin is going to eat him like a sandwich. >> he would rather have a puppet as president. >> you're the puppet. >> just how powerful is he? >> putin has authority. >> i don't see any checks on his power. >> so power, he rigged the american election? >> of course, he would want hillary clinton to lose. he despised hillary clinton. >> who do you like better? >> americans ask, what does he want? and is he really the most powerful man in the world? december 5, 1989, it was a cold
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night in germany, and it would change the course of vladimir putin's life. the berlin wall had just fallen. [ chanting ] all over east germany, angry crowds roamed the streets, lashing out at symbols of communist rule. that night in dresden, they found a target, the local kgb headquarters. a mob surrounded the building. as the hour grew later, the crowd grew larger. inside, peering through the curtains was a young kgb lieutenant colonel named vladimir putin.
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>> he was terrified that people stormed the building. >> reporter: putin was a junior officer, but the boss was away. he was in charge. >> police wanted to help, and he called for instructions. >> reporter: desperate for help, putin dialed kgb headquarters in moscow, over and over again. finally, one official told him simply, moscow is silent. >> and i think it felt like a deep betrayal to him. >> reporter: vladimir putin was on his own. he went down into the bowels of the building and fired up the furnace. >> he finds himself in the basement at a furnace shoveling documents as he hears demonstrations out on the street. >> they are burning the secret files so fast that the furnace
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is blowing up. >> reporter: putin torched thousands of pages of kgb documents and secrets. and as the crowd closed in -- with the fire still ranging, putin went outside and faced them all. by himself. there are armed guards inside, he told them. they will shoot you. >> and he is able to bluff his way out of it and tell the crowd, don't try it here. you're going to get hurt. >> reporter: putin's threat worked. the mob dispersed. >> this is what stays with putin all the time, the the fear. of popular uprising. >> reporter: vladimir putin quells that fear with absolute control.
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this is what control looks like. in one of the world's busiest cities, the streets are emptied for vladimir putin's motorcade. 12 million people simply disappear on putin's inauguration day. the event was perfectly produced for russian television. every detail, flawlessly planned. almost every detail. a few russians did not follow
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the script. >> literally a block away from his inauguration was a cafe called jean jaques where the opposition liked to gather and drink wine and drink coffee. and the riot police descend on the cafe. they started arresting people sitting at their tables outside, turning over tables, breaking cups and plates. ♪ >> reporter: the crackdown was not shown on russian television. >> for 94% of russians, their
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main source of news is television. if it didn't happen on television, it didn't happen. >> reporter: putin controls television. >> there is absolutely no critical words about vladimir putin on the russian air waves. none, not one word. >> reporter: putin controls everything in russia. >> putin has an untrammepled authority. i don't see any checks on his power. >> he is able to make singular, rapid decisions. the absolute is in there. it's unlike anything i have seen in russia. >> reporter: all that power is propped up by an astonishing approval rating, 80%, and that's according to american pollsters.
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>> donald trump wins the presidency. >> reporter: but when the united states elected a new president -- >> president trump. >> reporter: it looked like russia had fallen for a new leader. [ speaking foreign language ] >> reporter: there were toasts all over moscow, at the parliament known as the duma. on talk shows and at bars. ♪ we are the champions of the world ♪ >> reporter: but one man who seemed utterly unsurprised by trump's victory -- [ speaking foreign language ] >> he is happy to take credit, and that means that he won the u.s. election. the man who is simultaneously president of russia and in charge of the united states. >> mr. putin.
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>> reporter: trump impersonators are everywhere in russia. [ speaking foreign language ] >> you're fired. you're fired. you're fired. >> reporter: but it could be an american tv program that best describes the putin/trump relationship. >> i think he views trump as an apprenti apprentice. >> reporter: at the heart of all this are some deadly serious questions. does vladimir putin have some kind of hold over donald trump? how much of a role did he have in meddling in america's elections? i tried to ask him. mr. putin did not agree to answer my questions, but his closest aide, dmitry peskov did. t >> the answer is very simple, no. you're humiliating yourselves
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saying a country can intervene in your election process. america, a huge country, country number with the most powerful country in the world, that's simply impossible. >> reporter: we will get at the truth of all this, but to do that, we need to go back to the final days of the country vladimir putin loved. >> i think that down deep in putin, there is this sense of extraordinary humiliation over the collapse of the soviet union. because it wasn't just the soviet union, it was the russian empire. [ chanting ] >> reporter: putin returned home from his kgb posting in 1990 to a country he did not recognize. the ussr had been transformed. by the policy of openness.
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>> a lot of things happened very quickly. >> coca-cola. coca-co coca-cola. >> the romance with things western. [ chanting ] >> reporter: freedom came fast, and it exposed the rock at the heart of soviet communiscommuni. across the soviet union, hundreds of thousands of people began demanding democracy and national independence. it was once again what putin feared most. the people rising up. and finally, the people won. >> tonight in moscow at the kremlin, the red flag of the failed soviet union at last came down and the flag of russia
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rose. >> 300 years of history erased. >> reporter: soviet institutions like the kgb simply ceased to exist. >> vladimir putin views the breakup of the soviet union as he said himself, to be the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century. >> reporter: it was a traumatic time, and it sparked a profound change in vladimir putin. he became a politician, deputy mayor in his hometown of st. petersburg. it was not a big job, but putin clearly had big dreams. he commissioned this rarely seen documentary about himself, presenting vladimir putin, the credit's read, in power.
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weirdly, the sound track is from the broadway show, "cats." the ambitious putin may already have been looking toward moscow because the russian people were desperate for strong leadership. under president boris yeltsen, the new democracy was a mess. >> the entire soviet system, it just collapsed. >> reporter: the oligarchs, the men who profited on the spoils of communism, became fantastical fantastically rich. >> more top cars in all of russia than the rest of europe. >> reporter: but ordinary russians were sinking into desperate poverty. there were dire food shortages, even starvation.
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>> i don't know h . >> translator: i don't know how to feed my kids without milk. i just don't know what we're going to do. >> reporter: president boris yeltsen was in charge, but he seemed increasingly unstable. ♪ >> he is drinking. ♪ he is barely being propped up. >> reporter: russians began calling for a new leader. >> they were tired of the embarrassments of yeltsen. >> reporter: waiting in the wings was vladimir putin. he had taken a job inhierarchy, had risen through the ranks with lightning speed. >> from bureaucrat to superstar. >> reporter: he had become acting prime minister when it had become blatantly clear, the
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country needed a new president. >> when yeltsen was ready to topple over, they were waiting and he could not be put in jail. >> reporter: he was notoriously corrupt, but power brokers wanted to protect him. >> so the deal was made. the deal was made. >> reporter: december 31, 1999. >> the surprise announcement from boris yeltsen that he is resigning as president and turning over power to his prime minister, vladimir putin. >> reporter: in the very first moments of the 21st century, vladimir putin became president of russia. his first words -- [ speaking foreign language ] >> reporter: we live in a competitive world, and we are not among its leaders. and right away, putin began to
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change his country. he joined soldiers on the front lines lines. he assured soldiers better times were ahead. >> i think we'll get paid and we'll have work. >> reporter: the country quickly fw fell in love with vladimir putin. the number one song in russia was called "a man like putin." ♪ >> he is just very -- he's a beautiful man, you see? >> reporter: but the biggest surprise -- america also loved vladimir putin. president george w. bush thought he had found a kindred spirit. >> i looked the man in the eye. i found him to be very straight
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forward, and trustworthy. i was able to get a sense of his soul. ♪ >> reporter: even hollywood fell for the new russian president. ♪ >> reporter: he bonded with stars at a charity dinner. but the honeymoon would soon come to a crashing halt. >> he was a kgb agent. by definition, he doesn't have a soul. >> how are you? so glad to see you. >> reporter: next, when vladimir met hillary. >> it's important to remember how much he despised hillary
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clinton. ♪ the fastest samsung ever demands t-mobile, the fastest network ever. right now get the new samsung galaxy s9 for half off. ♪ want us to do about what woulthis president?fathers i'm tom steyer, and when those patriots wrote the constitution here in philadelphia, they created the commander in chief to protect us from enemy attack the justice department just indicted 13 russians
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how many times would he leave his mark? how many times will she light up the world? this is the woman. >> reporter: at the heart of the hacking scandal that rocked the 2016 presidential election -- >> ladies and gentlemen -- >> reporter: was an old grudge. >> my mother, my hero and our next president, hillary clinton. ♪ this is my fight song >> reporter: it went beyond islology. it was prison. vladimir putin was not a fan of hillary clinton. >> of course putin wanted hillary clinton to lose. he hated hillary clinton. >> prime minister, we have a lot
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of problems -- >> reporter: the tension here brewing for years. in 2001, another american leader, george w. bush, vouched for putin. >> i was able to get a sense of his soul. >> thank you. thank you. thank you. >> reporter: but on the campaign trail in 2008, hillary had a different take. >> i could have told him he was a kgb definition. by definition, he doesn't have a soul. i mean, this is a waste of time, right? >> mrs. clinton said you as a kgb agent, by definition can have no stole. >> reporter: his reply, statesmen shouldn't be judged by their life. >> he is a very arrogant person to deal with. we have to stand up to his bullying. he is somebody who will take as much as epossibhe possibly can.
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>> reporter: but it is what happened in 2011 that marked a point of no return. [ chanting ] >> reporter: it began with the arab spring protest early that year. the kind of popular uprising that putin dreaded. >> he begins to see himself through the eyes of them. >> reporter: of egypt, he was facing prosecution. bashar al assad was on the ropes. libya's strongman, muammar gaddafi met a similar fate. brutally killed after begging for his life. putin may have feared the same bloody fear for himself. [ chanting ] >> reporter: just a few weeks later, rebellion arrived in russia. tens of thousands rallied in the
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streets of moscow. the biggest protest there since the fall of the soviet union. >> people were hanging off lamp posts. people were in the streets. really shocking. >> reporter: putin was now living the same nightmare he had endured as a kgb officer in east germany in 1989. this time, in his own backyard. and he wasn't even president at the time. he was prime minister, having handed the presidency over to his associate, dmitry medvedev. >> as the winter went longer and longer and got colder and colder, the protests got bigger and bigger. >> reporter: as putin saw people turning against him, hillary clinton weighed in.
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>> the russian people, like people everywhere, deserve the right to have their voices heard and their votes counted. >> when putin hears something like that, i imagine he hears bush talking about saddam hussein. he hears that as, they are coming for me. they're trying to drive me from power. what the hell do you know about my people and whether they deserve to have their voices heard? like, i'll tell you if they should have their voices heard. >> reporter: with his back against the wall -- [ chanting ] >> reporter: putin turned the tables. he blamed the protests on hillary clinton. claiming that she was the one who incited them with her complaints about the election. >> there are growing
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restrictions on the exercise of fundamental rights. >> quote/unquote, she sent a signal. that was his words. >> reporter: putin's strategy propelled him to victory. in march, 2012, he won re-election handily. fighting back tears after a tense fight to maintain his power. [ chanting ] >> reporter: and he now will rule russia until the year 2024 at least. but vladimir putin never forgot
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about the woman who had kicked him when he was down. >> you think he resolved, you interfered with my elections. who can play this game? >> i think that's the line of thinking that led him to the intervention. i mean i'm totally convinced the russians were meddling and intervening covertly. >> reporter: u.s. intelligence concluded that putin personally ordered a campaign to influence the american election. in part, because he holds a grudge for clinton's comments in 2011. putin has denied that russia was hacking the democrats. >> translator: i don't know anything about that. you know how many hackers there are today. it's an extremely difficult thing to check. >> reporter: the russians allegedly focused their attack on a particularly weak target, the democratic national
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committee. >> you could have broken into the dnc with a can opener. this took less work to get into the dnc's computer systems than it took for watergate burglars to get into the dnc offices back during the nixon campaign. >> more than 1,900 e-mails released -- >> reporter: in the middle of a tight race, embarrassing e-mails mysteriously leaked from the clinton campaign were all over the news. >> wikileaks has released -- >> another round of stolen e-mails. >> the clinton campaign notes -- >> this is pretty much a trump dream come true. >> reporter: donald trump was delighted by clinton's misfortun misfortunes. >> russia, if you are listening, i hope you're able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing. >> reporter: recent indictments from special counsel robert mueller, also reveal a social media operation that allegedly worked to help trump win.
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>> donald j. trump will become the 45th president of the united states defeating hillary clinton. >> reporter: then the american election went putin's way. >> i just received a call from secretary clinton. >> hillary clinton was quite negative about our country and her attitude. >> it wouldn't be bad to get along with russia, right? it wouldn't be bad. >> and the other candidate, donald trump, was saying, we have to find some understanding. >> when people like me, i like them. even putin. >> whom would you like better? >> this is not the outcome we wanted. >> reporter: hillary clinton suffered one of the most shocking defeats in american history. >> i know how disappointed you feel because i feel it too. >> reporter: at least in part, some observers say, because of the alleged hacking and social media operations. >> this is painful and it will be for a long time. >> reporter: putin had
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apparently avenged his old grudge. >> so help me god. >> congratulations, mr. president. >> reporter: and he may have achieved even more. >> the 45th president of the united states. >> if donald trump is in some way compromised, if the russian government has something that it feels has on him in terms of leverage, that's a very serious thing. i don't suggest for a second that i have the answer to this question, but we can't just let this matter drop. >> reporter: up next -- >> a prominent opposition figure has been shot and killed. >> four of the shots hit him in the back. >> right out investiga the open blocks from the kremlin. >> reporter: the story putin might want the world to forget. (vo) do not go gentle into that good night, old age should burn and rave at close of day;
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>> reporter: february 27, 2015 e nearly midnight. a man and woman walk across the moscow king bridge right next to the kremlin. a highly monitored area, littered with surveillance cameras. all those cameras, but amazingly, this grainy, faraway video is the only footage that exists of a critical moment in russian history. inside the circle of what a moscow tv station reports to be boris nemsov and his girlfriend. he was the well known opposition leader who led the protests in 2011. the station says that while this
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snowplow hides the two from camera's view, he was killed, shot four times in the back. >> a prominent russian opposition figure has been shot and killed. >> four of the shots hit him in the black. >> right out in the open, just blocks from the kremlin. >> reporter: so who murdered him? vladimir putin condemned the killing, calling it shameful and impude impudent. and five chechians thought the same. it was said that only one group could be that professional. >> his girlfriend who he was walking with didn't realize he had been shot until the car was already driving off. it was quick and professional, and nobody has that kind of training outside the government.
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>> reporter: senator john mccain takes it one step further. >> vladimir put seasin is a thu a murderer and a killer. he had him murdered in the shadow of the kremlin. >> this is a personal insult. it is lousy behavior from a competition. >> reporter: that is dmitry peskov. >> there is nothing to comment on. it's nonsense. >> reporter: his regime has been accused of involvement in the do deaths in many of his critics. the scholar responds. >> there is not a shred of evidence. there is not a single fact to sustain these allegations, but they take on a folklorish reality. >> reporter: the allegations that putin might have played a
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role in boris' murder may stem in part in the result that he had been accumulating against the president. >> he was about to reveal information that would prove russia's involvement in the conflict in ukraine. >> reporter: that ukraine report was released a few months after th n nemsov's murder. there was something released in 2012 that was embarrassing for putin. it claimed he had 43 planes, 15 helicopters and 4 yachts at his disposal, including a superyacht. then there are the palaces. the report says there were 20 presidential palaces available to putin at any time. one of the palaces known in the press simply as, putin's palace was said to be worth $1 billion. >> this is not true. this is actually perverted
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commenting of reality. >> reporter: putin's spokesman, dmitry peskov, says every war leader, especially the leader of a new power like russia or the united states has access to state-owned homes and and planes and helicopters that have secure communications. >> of course, he uses these vehicles. this plane, these residences, but it's not his property. the rumors about his wealth, the rumors about the palaces has nothing to do with reality. it's just lies. >> reporter: the rumors of putin's wealth, well, some of them are simply staggering. >> and some people including myself believe that he is the richest man in the world or one of them. >> reporter: a former world investor, is one of putin's toughest critics. >> you think he is the richest man in the world?
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>> i think that. and i'm not just saying that crazily. >> estimate his net worth. >> $200 billion. >> really? >> i believe that it's $200 billion. >> reporter: that would make him wealthier than the man whom "forbes" says is the wealthiest, jeff bezos. >> this is billions and billions of dollars of his fortune. this is not true. don't believe them. he has got nothing. he has got what he rides in his daily personal and financial declaration every year. >> reporter: putin's most recent financial declaration says that he personally owns less than half an acre of land, a roughly 900-square foot apartment and a 200-square foot garage into which he puts the vehicles listed in that document. two russian sedans, a four by
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four, and something like this. the top u.s. treasury official adam zubin talked to the bbc. >> i'm not in the position to give you figure, but he draws $110,000 a year. that is not an accurate statement of the man's wealth. >> reporter: if putin was getting rich, he wasn't the only one in russia. take this statisti statistic. in 1996 when putin had just moved to moscow and begun his climb to the top, there were no billionaires in all of russia. by 2014, russia had 111 billionaires according to "forbes." and while moscow now has multiple bentley dealerships to satisfy its billionaires, the average wage in russia is less than $700 a month. that's lower than the average wage in china according to the
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international labor organizat n organization. but despite all the allegations, despite all the accusations, the fact remains vladimir putin is remarkably popular in russia. why? we'll tell you when we come back. i have type 2 diabetes. i'm trying to manage my a1c, and then i learn type 2 diabetes puts me at greater risk for heart attack or stroke. can one medicine help treat both blood sugar and cardiovascular risk? i asked my doctor. he told me about non-insulin victoza®. victoza® is not only proven to lower a1c and blood sugar, but for people with type 2 diabetes
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i we worked with pg&eof to save energy because wenie. wanted to help the school. they would put these signs on the door to let the teacher know you didn't cut off the light. the teachers, they would call us the energy patrol. so they would be like, here they come, turn off your lights! those three young ladies were teaching the whole school about energy efficiency. we actually saved $50,000.
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and that's just one school, two semesters, three girls. together, we're building a better california. trr most powerful man in the world is also the most popular. vladimir putin's approval rating has soared as high as 86% in recent years. consider that american presidents are happy when they break the 50% mark. how has he done it? partly, it's the cult of putin. he has mastered the art of the manly photo op. he rides horseback, bare chest. finds ancient treasures underwater. he rides a submarine to the bottom of the black sea and
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flies planes, fights forest fires. >> there is something ridiculous about the middle aged world leader riding shirtless on a horse like conan the barbarian after a dozen doughnuts. who thinks this looks good? >> everything that we find ridiculous about vladimir putin is very appealing in the universe that he controls absolutely. >> reporter: perhaps the foundation of the putin juggernaut is a political tourism no matter where you live. it's the economy. after the chaotic years of boris yeltsin, putin stepped in and stabilized the country, and he rode the wave of ever-rising oil prices. which in russia's resource-rich economy translated into rising wages and stooaring stock industries. then late in 2010, the party stopped.
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oil prices slumped and soon came western economic sanctions. vladimir putin has navigated hard times well. he has slashed social spending, allowed aruba to fall, and kept it in check. he is a conservative. >> the outward seeming aspect of wealth looks closer to dubai than it does to moscow 30 years ago. just an amazing transformation. >> reporter: add to the exhibition, putin's secret sauce, nationalism. and it surged in 2014 after an invasion that shocked the world. >> bigger nations must not be allowed to bully the small. >> reporter: vladimir putin grabbed a piece of ukraine for russia. the west was horrified. >> that's the thing that adolf hitler did in the 1930s. we thought those days were gone.
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>> reporter: but it looked very different through russian eyes. >> i never accepted the notion of ukraine as a separate state. >> reporter: many ukrainians deeply resented the invasion. but not russians. they see it as the revival as a deep sense of power and national destiny. >> putin has given them their pride back. russia is once again a great power. ♪ >> reporter: putinism is an ideology of social conservativism, of anti-westernism, and above all, national power. putin might say he has made russia great again. sound familiar? >> we will make america great again.
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[ chanting ] >> reporter: like putin, trump has used nationalism to boost his support, but many believe that donald trump is no vladimir putin. >> putin is a much more practiced, subtle, cunning player. he is playing in poker terms, a couple of deuces at the highest level. he has reasserted russia on the world stage. from a position of relative weakness like nobody i can think of. that's an amazing feat of geopolitics. ♪ the fastest samsung ever demands t-mobile, the fastest network ever. because fast should be fast. ♪ right now get the new samsung galaxy s9 for half off.
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it relieves all your worst symptoms including nasal congestion, which most pills don't. it's more complete allergy relief. and all from a gentle mist you can barely feel. flonase sensimist helps block 6 key inflammatory substances. most pills only block one. and 6 is greater than 1. flonase sensimist. but mania, such as unusualrder can changes in your mood,able. activity or energy levels, can leave you on shaky ground. help take control by asking about your treatment options. vraylar is approved for the acute treatment of manic or mixed episodes of bipolar i disorder in adults. clinical studies showed that vraylar reduced overall manic symptoms. vraylar should not be used in elderly patients with dementia due to increased risk of death or stroke. call your doctor about fever, stiff muscles, or confusion, which may mean a life-threatening reaction, or uncontrollable muscle movements,
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which may be permanent. side effects may not appear for several weeks. high cholesterol and weight gain; high blood sugar, which can lead to coma or death; decreased white blood cells, which can be fatal; dizziness upon standing; falls; seizures; impaired judgment; heat sensitivity; and trouble swallowing may occur. you're more than just your bipolar i. ask your doctor about vraylar.
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. >> reporter: finally, here are my thoughts on he whom we have called the most powerful man in the world. first, let me explain the title. the united states and china for that matter, are more powerful countries than russia of course, but the power of a head of state is determined both by the country's strength and the capacity he or she has to exercise that power unilaterally, unconstrained by other institutions, parties or political forces. and combining those two metrics, it's easy to see why vladimir putin rises to the top. he has created what he calls a vertical of power, unlike any we have seen in other great nations. as the russian grand chess master has noted himself as a critic of putin, the authority rests on one man.
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when the czar died after all, you knew the process by which his sayseuccessor, his son, woue elevated. the bureau would select his successor bus when putin dies, i almost said if -- what will happen? no one knows. to understand putin, you have to understand russia. the last hundred years for that country have seen the fall of the czar, the collapse of democracy, the great depression, world war ii with its tens of millions of russians dead, stalin's totalitarian brutalities, the breakup of the soviet union, boris yeltsin's years of chaos and corruption, and then comes vladimir putin who ushers in almost two decades of stability and a popular perception, rising standards of living and increasing prominence and respect in the world.
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respect is important. russians have immense national pride. russia is after all, the largest country on the planet. 48 times larger than germany. it encompasses 11 time zones and straddles europe, asia and the middle east. it is also a rich country, containing some of the largest deposits of war material, from oil and natural gas to nickel. culturally, it has touted itself preserving christianity even as falling to the barbarians. putin understands russia, but he also understands the world. he is not foolish enough to make a frontal assault on america or europe. he knows how to use power asymmetrically. with cybertools. he understands the faults of societies and discord and a gaping openness. he understands the fragility of
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institutions like the europe union and nato and ideas like integration and diversity. in other words, vladimir putin understands us very well. the question is, do we? does donald trump really understand him? the power of television on display this weekend. i'm brian stelter and this is "reliable sources." our weekly look at the story behind the story, and how the media really works. n how the news gets made. there is breaking news on trump's legal team, and this news from a shocking resignation letter. it was written by colonel ralph peters, calling fox a propaganda machine. do others agree with him? and this time really is different. the march for our life social security over. what is next? the