my buddy jim bourne. the premise is straight forward. a despotic russian leader.to follow an historical roadmap to rebuild the union of soviet socialist republic in his image. his image is exact. it's one of vladimir putin. james boirnls here. it's finally here. a two-year journey. everyone seems to think we did this in the last three months and knew how things were working out, because it is timely we have to acknowledge. >> it was completed two years ago. we mad been working on it for three years. we had no idea things would turn out the way they have. lou: your modesty is overwhelming. >> we said what if, and we looked at the scenarios for the most entertaining thrail themmer we could find and putin ended being the most interesting character to put in the book. lou: a park advertising despot as -- a practicing despot as well. any relationship between reality and mr. putin is just pure coincidence, isn't it? >> coincidence or less, depends on how you look at it. lou: a lot of people were starting to talk favorably about vladimir putin in those days. when we deci