author and journalist and writes about russian affairs and weekly in cairo in brussels we have gilbert doctorow he's an independent scholar and author of great post cold war american thinkers. in international relations also here in the studio with me is yon hella big he is the managing partner of the law firm hell decline and use of and author of always art on democratic competition all right gentlemen crosstalk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want. you've been writing about russian politics for a long time how is this campaign change the climate of environment of russian politics. well i think we have seen a very big change in russian politics because politics has come alive again. first when putin came to power in two thousand there was so huge crisis which he managed and everybody was more or less the negre meant what he was doing so there was no discussion. for it for just a second. during various presidency there came some issues came up but there was no dialogue from the out of sight when he was the other side from the other side who's the other side well that's a

i think it's very interesting to compare the two cases ok and i could go now to brussels to gilbert doctorow gilbert i mean how do you see this election year because i watched western media very closely and they did try to discredit this election and the russian people in the process because they actually went to the polls turnout is very very good and they made their voice clear how were they going to western media to deal with use now. no i don't think that the level of plurality of ladin reports and will make any difference on the reporting in the western media they have already prepared themselves well in advance and within the context of an ongoing and heated up information war between russia and the west it's a war that's not of russia's choosing but it's being imposed and i think the most recent example of how this plays out came the. yesterday and the day before yesterday when six of the leading editors in chief of the world daily newspapers in toronto in tokyo in frankfurt and paris were invited to two. country. for what should have been a trauma offensive and then there are the tra