donald jensen is the director of russia and strategic stability at the u.s.titute of peace, and a former u.s. diplomat in moscow. welcome to the program. pavel, quite interesting the way people are divided over the legacy of gorbachev now we do understand that president putin won't be attending the funeral. , there will be no official state funeral. is this because of the prevailing sentiment in the establishment and among many russians that this is someone who was very naive in dealing with the west? guest: gorbachev was not naive. i mean, i knew the man. we had quite a number of meetings and discussed different things. he was anything but naive. of course, maybe his education was a bit, you know, kind of party-style, going through the ranks of the party. but still, he was a very shrewd and very effective political operator which allowed him to get to the tops of the russian soviet leadership. and he was not naive. he had ideas. he believed in them and that was not only his ideas that was a group of party top officials who wanted to believe that they could c

she's now in munich, germany and in washington dc. donald jensen is the director of russia and strategic stability at the us institute of peace and former u. s. diplomat in moscow. welcome to the program, pavel quite interesting, the way people are divided over the legacy of god. but now we do understand that a president put in won't be attending the funeral. there will be no official state funeral is, is because of the prevailing sentiment in the establishment. and among many russians that this is someone who was very naive in dealing with the west. oh good. but it was not naive. i mean, i knew the man i, we had a greater number of meetings in discuss different things. he was anything, but of course he may be his education was a bit here now kind of party style going through the ranks of the party. but still, he was a very shrewd and very effective, both the co operator, which allows him to get to the tops of the russian soviet leadership. and he was not naive. he had ideas, he believed in them. and that was not only his ideas, that was a group of party top officials who wanted to belie

donald trump came very close in 2016, quite famously. and it is an interesting test case of how the politics of this are playing their. and it seems like jensenht side of this right now. >> i think you are correct. and what we see in minnesota is the latest example in a trend we have seen -- we have seen republican candidates in arizona, north carolina, in michigan, tried to backtrack from their professed desire to ban abortion, often all circumstances, often with no exception for rape or incest. many things have changed right now. this is a general election, not a primary. the overturn of roe v. wade is no longer theoretical. it is real. and there is all sorts of reasons that you want, if you are republican, to avoid adopting such an unpopular position. but what i want to emphasize is that this is not new for the republican party. since the day that roe is overturned, we saw the republican senatorial campaign arm advising candidates to say that they would not criminalize doctors for performing abortions. >> right. >> and that simply isn't true. republicans know that, in many ways, they are not on the populous side of this issue. and that is