we mentioned david remnick. we want to bring him in, editor of the "new yorker" magazine by way of telling you before joining the "new yorker" david lived in russia for four years as the moscow correspondent for the "washington post." he's an expert on that country, so much so he wrote a book on it, "lenin's tomb, the last days of the soviet empire" won a pulitzer prize now he has co-bylined this exhaustive report in the "new yorker" about russia's relationship with our new president and david is here tonight to help us lay this out. >> exhaustive doesn't mean long. >> i joked i took the day off and read the article. >> magisterial. >> part of this conversation will be urging anyone watching to read it because of the way you chose to map out the relationship. in broad strokes, when i know we all grew up the cold war was about then the soviet union and our country in ways that had us hiding under our desks in grade school but with big ticket items, missiles with -- measured in things like throw weights and it was

we mentioned david remnick. we want to bring him in, editor of the "new yorker" magazine by way of telling you before joining the "new yorker" david lived in russia for four years as the moscow correspondent for the "washington post." he's an expert on that country, so much so he wrote a book on it, "lenin's tomb, the last days of the soviet empire" won a pulitzer prize now he has co-bylined this exhaustive report in the "new yorker" about russia's relationship with our new president and david is here tonight to help us lay this out. >> exhaustive doesn't mean long. >> i joked i took the day off and read the article. >> magisterial. >> part of this conversation will be urging anyone watching to read it because of the way you chose to map out the relationship. in broad strokes, when i know we all grew up the cold war was about then the soviet union and our country in ways that had us hiding under our desks in grade school but with big ticket items, missiles with -- measured in things like throw weights and it was

we were talking to david remnick earlier. we all go back to an era of a cold war with russia.go back to things like missiles and aircraft carriers and the kind of base fear we grew up with. this is so different now. in a way, lower ticket, lower tech. for lack of a double authentication on google, foreign power can hack into the american election and then some. so how have the tools of the battle changed? how much have they changed, barry? >> let me start off by saying i've spent most of my adult life studying the russians. and it's been a good bet as the soviet union came apart in and out of moscow, kiev, mostly arms control dealings, tremendous admiration for the russian people -- physics, math, ballet, literature, courageous military. they've turned into a criminal oligarchy run by this fellow putin who is a very clever politician. they are a major threat to their neighbors and to u.s. interests. they are dangerous. they're in syria. they've participated in a modest way in murdering a half million people. crimea, they're active inside ukraine. they're a threat to the baltic

as another american journal since also there earlier in those rough days, david remnick of "the new yorker" says moscow at that time was a pageant, irresistible to anyone with even a trace of democratic idealism and fellow feeling for the russians the essence of historical drama was unmistakable. there was a much human tragedies to be seen but reasons for hope, and we all debated. i'm sure you did with your colleagues, could russia finally throw off autocratic sluggish government? wasn't there a real change in the offing? it seemed that might happen. because a friend of russia and of russians, ambassador mcfaul, then mike mcfaul worked overtime to try to encourage reforms. we knew it wouldn't be easy or quick but we thought it might be possible. it was not to be. by the time ambassador mcfaul went to moscow in 2012, his best efforts to improve the relationship were doomed to fail. in the second term of vladimir putin as president, who invaded crimea and sent little green men into eastern ukraine. the kremlin appeared to decide also wrongly that ambassador mcfaul was an intelligence officer

and david remnick and his colleagues at the new yorker are trying to follow the money and some of thatoney, if we had the tax returns, we would be sure that none of it involved purchases from or bank accounts from anyone who might have had some dealings with the president of the united states. >> well, again, i agree. and i think finding out whether there were investments made in trump organizations has to be part of what we're looking at. that would take a majority vote of the committee and one of the things that i've been glad to see is that we've seen very strong statements from people like susan collins and marco rubio. so they, too, believe this has got to be bipartisan and follow the intelligence. and we've got to use all of the tools at our disposal. >> there is a lot of reporting that, in fact, the fbi had planned on paying the author, the former agent, the british agent who is working on that so-called dossier and then those plans fell through. what do we know now about that connection? >> well, that again is one of the unanswered questions and the fbi will be working with it

the cover story, active measures, what lay behind russia interference written by david remnick.rked for years as a correspondent in moscow. i spoke to him earlier about what he thinks is driving russia to interfere in our democracy. the magazine cover is a rift on the cover from 1985. the magazine's name is in cyrillic. attempting to create turbulence in the u.s. for russia, that is a way to overcome their inherent weakness. >> look, what does russia want? it doesn't just want the end to economic sanctions. it wants us out of their realm of what putin sees as its interests. when we raise something about oppression of journalists, you can be darn sure the next time that comes up that we're going to hear about enemies of the people, the phrase that donald trump used to describe you and me. >> yeah. it's interesting -- >> there's a kind of moral equivalence. >> so far, i don't even know if you can say there's smoke. there's certainly a lot of questions about contacts between the people around donald trump, about, around president trump and candidate trump and previously businessman

as another american journalist was also there a little earlier but in those rough days, period, david remnickf "the new moscow at that time was a hedge, irresistible to anyone with even a trace of democratic idealism and a sense of fellow feeling from the russians. the sense of historical trauma was incredible. we all debated, i'm sure you did with your colleagues, could russia finally throw off autocratic, thuggish government? was there a real change in the offing here? it seemed that might happen. as a friend of russia and russians, ambassador mcfaul, mcfaul, worked overtime to encourage reforms. we knew it wouldn't be easy or quick, but we thought it might be possible. it was not to be. mcfaultime ambassador went to moscow in 2012, his best efforts to improve the relationship were dim to fail. in the second term of latimer putin, as president, putin invaded crimea and sent little green men into eastern ukraine. the kremlin appeared to have that ambassador mcfaul was an intelligence officer, with the task of fomenting another color revolution in moscow. so he was followed, pressured, badger