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Dec. 27, 2016 - Making Sense - Sam Harris

41:13

#58 — The Putin Question

Sam Harris speaks with Garry Kasparov about the problem of waning American power, the rise of Putin, the coming presidency of Donald Trump, computer chess, the future of artificial intelligence, and other topics. If the Making Sense podcast logo in your player is BLACK, you can SUBSCRIBE to gain access to all full-length episodes at samharris.org/subscribe.

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	Welcome to the Making Sense Podcast.
	This is Sam Harris.
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	I am talking with Gary Kasparov, the former world chess champion, perhaps the most famous of modern times, and now a great critic perhaps the most famous of modern times, and now a great critic of Vladimir Putin's Russia, and a great critic of the failures of American and European with respect to Russia.
	Needless to say, this is a very timely conversation, given the man who will soon occupy the Oval Office and given the people he has appointed to advise him.
	And so without further preamble, I give you Gary Kasparov.
	I am here with Gary Kasparov.
	Garry, thanks for coming on the podcast.
	Thanks for inviting me.
	Listen, it's really an honor to get to talk to you.
	I'm sorry we can't do it in person, but we will be forgiven any audio hiccups here.
	We're doing this by Skype and you are half a world away and it's late at night over there.
	So again, thank you for taking the time to do this.
	Oh, okay.
	Thanks for more technology that we can do it, you know, staying a thousand miles away from each other.
	Yeah.
	There's a lot to talk about.
	There are really two broad areas that I want to touch with you.
	The first I want to get into is politics, obviously, and the recent Russian influence on our presidential election.
	The second is that we have to say something about the future of intelligent machines, because I've been talking a lot about artificial intelligence on the podcast, and While you will go down in history for many things, one of those things will be that you were the first person to be beaten by a machine in an intellectual pursuit where you were the most advanced member of our species.
	You will have a special place in history, even if that history is written by our robot overlords.
	We have to talk about that, but we'll get into politics first.
	And you've written a fascinating book entitled Winter is Coming.
	You argue several things in the book, but generally you claim that free and open societies like our own have grown weaker, especially because we no longer think in terms of spreading our values to the rest of the world.
	Many people consider this a a return to some kind of humility and political realism, but you consider it a failure of nerve.
	And I must say, I agree with you there.
	Your specific claim is that while we're now facing many threats, and many which we seem ill-prepared to deal with, the worst of these threats is coming from Vladimir Putin and his current Russia.
	So perhaps you can just start there with your political thesis.
	Yes.
	Let's start with the title of the book, Winter's Coming.
	I have to confess, I'm a fan of Game of Thrones.
	I even read all the books.
	And I thought the title was very appropriate because it could indicate two things.
	One is that the history is not developed on a linear basis.
	And it was somehow a delayed response to, for instance, Fukuyama, The End of History in 1992, the bestselling book.
	And I have to admit that in 1992, I shared the same optimism, thinking that liberal democracies have won.
	And the rest would be, you know, just a bright future.
	So it's all up to us to build this future and the evil has been defeated once and for all.
	So I think we, you know, we yet to recognize that, you know, the evil doesn't disappear.
	So it probably happens in the books, in fairy tales, but in real life, the evil, you know, could be buried temporarily under the rubbles of Berlin Wall.
	But, you know, at one point it sprouts out, especially if we lose our vigilance and if we turn to be complacent.
	And also the idea of the title was, again, reflecting the motto of the House of Stark in Game of Thrones, is to indicate that this is not a winter, this is not a climate change, this is not this change of temperature, but this is something that happens, again, because we have grown weaker, because we don't understand the threat that is coming to hurt us and maybe to destroy our way of life.
	But it depends on us whether this winter is long or short, whether it's, you know, devastating or the effect is minimal.
	So it's like a warning.
	So that's why I thought the title would be appropriate.
	And, you know, to my surprise, and I publish few books and Sam, I'm sure you know, the publishers, they always come up with 10 different suggestions trying to shoot away your original title.
	I mean, this time they accepted the title, you know, recognizing that, you know, it had merits.
	But they were very cautious and almost rejected the subtitle.
	They said, oh, Vladimir Putin and the enemies of the free world.
	Is it about a cold war?
	Is this just, you know, old language that may, you know, scare people off?
	I said, yeah, it's a cold war because winter is coming.
	And now when I talk to my publisher, they're very happy that they actually agreed to have Vladimir Putin and the enemies of the free world.
	I can imagine.
	Because when they asked me, so what about the, you know, what about advertising?
	How are you going to do it?
	Because it was really, you know, just, you know, a very short cycle for writing and publishing.
	Me and McGringert, my co-author, so we approached them in January 2015.
	And I said, I said at our first meeting that I would like the book to be published in October.
	They asked me whether I meant October 2016.
	I said, no, 2015.
	I hope that the book would make difference for upcoming presidential elections, and it could help to shape debates on foreign policy between candidates from the major parties.
	And they were not sure that you can do it, because they said, you know, there's no time for advertising.
	And I said, look, as long as you have Putin as a centerpiece of the book, he will definitely create enough conflicts to make sure that the book will be always on the front page.
	Again, unfortunately, this prediction was right.
	And I have to say that, you know, things that I predict in the book, you know, they turn to be even worse than I thought.
	Because probably we live in a time when everything happens much quicker.
	So the time flies faster than it used to.
	I just want to stop you there, Gary, for a second, because I want to get into Putin specifically in some depth.
	But you use this term evil, which I want to flag for a moment, because unfortunately, this term has been really undermined in intelligent conversation.
	Many people just don't believe in evil.
	That's a great point, you know.
	Thank you very much for raising this point, because, you know, If we now look at American politics, you know, the partisanship, it reached such a level where, you know, people from two major parties consider their opponents evil.
	So, and you're right, you know, the word evil, you know, has been used and overused in a political debate between people who, you know, who disagree on many issues but still share the same core values.
	You know, they all, you know, represent different, you know, wings of liberal democracy.
	And what I wanted to emphasize in the book, and again, thanks for raising this point, is that, you know, we are being attacked by people that are, again, let me use this old cliché, Cold War cliché, the enemies of the free world, because they do not share the same values.
	And one of the fundamental differences between us and them is we believe, you know, in the uniqueness of human life.
	So the one person dead, you know, it's tragedy.
	For people like Putin, you know, hundreds of thousands dead is just, you know, it's a demonstration of strength.
	It's just statistics that proves that, you know, they are on the winning streak by, you know, by spreading their influence.
	So we have to realize that, you know, despite all the differences between, you know, different political groups and activists in the free world, We're still united by values that makes us very different from the other side of the world, where, you know, I could apply world evil, because it really threatens the way of life, you know, the very foundation of the free society.
	And value of human life is one of the things that brings together Putin, ISIS, Al-Qaeda, Iranian mullahs.
	They could look different, but at the end of the day, you know, They believe in something that is, you know, is not modern, something that, you know, that, you know, brings us, pushes us back to the past.
	And it's for those who are saying, oh, unlike Soviet Union, Putin's Russia is no longer an existential threat to the free world because it doesn't have the same ideology.
	My response is that probably you're right, but the Soviet project, though it was, you know, condemned by history, it was, you know, marked by repressions, by bloodshed, by devaluation of human life.
	It was still a project about the future.
	It was a futuristic project, based on wrong assumptions about human nature, that's why it failed, but it was still about the future.
	Well, today we're dealing with threats that all are looking for ideal society in a distant past.
	So, Putin looks for a 19th century imperial politics, Iranian mullahs for a medieval religious inquisition, and ISIS, of course, goes all the way back to the early caliphate.
	But it's all about something that has no connection to the modernity.
	And so that's why we could say that today we see the fight between modernity And archaic forces and somehow even, you know, the last U.S.
	elections was also about, you know, about a desperate attempt to look for an ideal model of the past.
	So, yeah.
	And that's why, again, I think it's it's it's I thought it would be very important to have the book on time for for a proper debate about U.S.
	policy since, you know, foreign policy since Whether we like it or not, the United States, as a leader of the free world, you know, defines the way the free world moves, you know, one way or another.
	And unfortunately, you know, this election was about, you know, throwing mud at each other, rather than talking about serious issues.
	And I was quite disappointed, but still, you know, it's probably now, while we're digesting the surprising results of these elections, we will have time to
	Think about the sort of the potential impact of all these important foreign policy issues to the life in the United States, especially because it became quite apparent that Putin's influence on the elections, even if it was not decisive, it was still a considerable factor that helped to tilt the election to the Trump side.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	Well, so before we get into Putin and the election, you've just raised this generic problem we have with dictators.
	Dictators with regimes that fundamentally don't share our values.
	Just generically speaking, how do you think we should deal with this problem?
	There's another paradox of modern times is that unlike 50 or 100 years ago,
	So, the technological advantage was always, you know, an important factor of the superiority of the free world because, you know, we know that the free society always could mobilize, you know, brains and intellectual resources to come up with new ideas, new industries, new technologies, and always to be ahead.
	Even the Soviet Union, you know, eventually lost the space race, though it was, you know, it was not Putin's Russia.
	It was, you know, the country that relied on resources of Russian empire, so the generations of scientists, and it was well advanced.
	So it was quite a unique experiment, though a failed experiment, and it managed to put, you know, Sputnik and the man in space even ahead of the Americans.
	Eventually, you know, it lost this race because closed societies, they cannot compete.
	Even the Soviet Union failed to compete with the United States in the technological race.
	But today, you know, things are different because the globalization, you know, as every new technology, every new technological process has two sides, like every coin.
	On one side, you know, we can spread things around, you know, we can do business, we can socialize, we can connect people.
	Many good things can happen by using this modern device, which is in everybody's pocket or a purse.
	But at the same time, you know, it helps bad guys to advance their cause.
	So you can socialize on, you know, on the net, but you can also build a very sophisticated terrorist network.
	Well, the dictators, as we can see now, they feel very comfortable with these modern devices because, you know, the Internet is not yet regulated.
	It's something that is, you know, is yet to become part of international law.
	And bad guys, they don't pay attention to any rules or limitations.
	So they have, by definition, an upper hand in something so new and so advanced.
	And getting access to this is, As easy, you know, as buying, you know, food in the store.
	So it's quite a paradox that while we relied on Twitter, Facebook, Google, and all these, you know, new brilliant technologies invented in the free world to promote the ideas of the free world, we're now seeing the opposite effect, that the dictators, the totalitarian regimes,
	They are successfully using these tools, very sophisticated tools, for propaganda, to actually promote ideas that are opposite to our values.
	Actually, not even ideas, but more likely fake news.
	It's more like poisoning minds of people, because it's almost impossible to identify what's true and what's not, since you are receiving so much information.
	And well-organized forces, you know, supported by massive budgets as Putin's Russia.
	So the propaganda machine could have a deadly effect, not only in Russia, not only in the Russian-speaking people around the world, but also on the minds of people in a free world.
	And this is a paradox that we have to understand and just to recognize that it's a new challenge and the free world was not ready for it.
	Yeah, well, one point you make in your book in several places is that we have pursued a path of engagement with Putin in particular, but with respect to many regimes that are fundamentally illiberal on the assumption that mere engagement, mere but with respect to many regimes that are fundamentally illiberal on the assumption that mere engagement, mere economic and social integration will moderate these regimes and get them to align with our interests and with the
	You then observe how foolish this has proved to be and it's pretty clear that some people only understand strength.
	And this goes back to this issue of evil, because many people have lost sight of the fact that there are people, you know, whether it's individual dictators or even whole cultures or subcultures, certainly, who are committed to very different aims in life.
	I mean, there are people who are malignantly selfish or just delusional.
	There are whole cultures that can be organized around delusional ideals.
	And I think what we're witnessing on our side, especially in recent years under Obama, and I say this as someone who's a real fan of Obama, I mean, I think he's An extremely smart and ethical and thoughtful person.
	And the contrast to the incoming president here is just appalling to me.
	But his foreign policy has been so anemic.
	It seems that our enemies no longer fear us and our friends really can't rely on us.
	And yet it's easy to see how we got here because there's this perception of just this absolute futility of foreign interventions because of what happened in Afghanistan and Iraq.
	And those are, you know, very different wars, as you know.
	One was probably necessary and one almost certainly wasn't, but they're both viewed as total failures.
	And there's this, I think, an agreement, certainly on the left and now even on, you know, what's now called the alternative right, that a sophisticated and realistic vision of America's place in the world Is one where we should be more isolated, more humble, more... I mean, just any notion of us really leading the world and trying to spread our values all the way across it is some kind of unethical claim upon empire.
	It seems to me that we have lost our sense that there really are right answers to questions of good and evil.
	There really is such a thing, potentially at least, as universal human values that we have to fight for.
	Let's start with this, you know, with your analysis about, you know, American intervention or isolationism as an alternative.
	Look, it's the 21st century.
	We are just about entering the year 2017.
	The globalized world is reality.
	Globalized trade is reality.
	No matter what President-elect says about trade and his threats to sort of to turn it around and just, you know, to go back to, you know, to protectionism.
	I don't believe it's going to happen because America is the most globalized economy.
	And when you look at the United States as a country with 330 million people, the country benefits from global trade.
	Yes.
	You know global trade as an average rate as a capitalism.
	Some people win some lose.
	But clearly you know when you look at the at the balance you know more people you know are on the on the on the beneficiary side.
	So you have to think about sort of softening the blow to others but trying to change things you know and to say oh now we can go back.
	You know we can you know back.
	This is this is exactly what I said you know when I talked about you know different societies looking for for the ideals that that are distant past.
	So, America in 2017 should look in 2030, 2040, 2050, not in 1950, 1960.
	There were certain things, you know, I wish the country could recover from those decades.
	And trying to hide in a shell, you know, ignore the fact that, I mean, someone has to lead.
	You know, if you create a vacuum, and this is the biggest lesson of Obama's presidency.
	You know, he meant well.
	He wanted to reach out to American enemies.
	And he just, you know, he did absolutely utmost to remove America, what he thought, you know, was, you know, negative American influence in world politics, trying to sort of to work through agreements, compromises.
	Yeah, it's it could be great if he had at the other side of the bargaining table, people, institutions, states that shared even 50 percent of his conviction about about The world, the our world should function.
	Unfortunately, it was not the case.
	So for Putin and the like, Obama's what they saw as flexibility and weakness was an open invitation to spread their influence.
	America was on retreat, thus creating vacuum.
	And this vacuum was filled not by force of peace and prosperity, but by forces of war and hatred.
	And again, There's no simple answer, you know, for, you know, for America's role in the world.
	You know, you separate wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
	You know, my problem with the war in Iraq, you know, in 2003, was that, you know, as someone who was born and raised in a communist country, I could never blame, could never condemn invasion, even invasion that led to a demise of dictatorship.
	You know, and it's, you know, people like me, we viewed, you know, the invasion as a liberation.
	I understand, you know, it could open, you know, a Pandora box.
	We can have a big debate about it.
	But this is also important for people in the United States to understand the views of those who are born on the other side of our curtain.
	Where, you know, anything that led to the collapse of dictatorship was a good idea.
	So that's why, you know, we had different views about American presidents, you know, viewing those who were strongest in opposing Soviet Union and communism as our best friends.
	Again, I understand, you know, it's a subject for debate.
	But let's, you know, move away from 2003, again, agreeing that, you know, we may disagree on that, and go to 2009.
	And this is, you know, something that Obama's decision, you know, to follow.
	By the way, that was Bush's plan, you know, to eventually move troops out of Iraq.
	So when in 2009 Obama looked at the global map, you know, I believe he thought that it was a good moment for America to exercise positive influence, soft power, you know, friendship to even to the nations that wish America ill and to, you know, extend the olive branch to friendship to even to the nations that wish America ill and to, you know, extend the olive
	Now, the failure in my view is based on the fact that if you play the game, you know, chess, and if you believe that you made a mistake a few moves ago, the biggest mistake, you know, would be to try to sort of go back and to change things because you're already having a certain situation at the board.
	And that's what happened with Iraq in 2009 when Obama tried to sort of to rectify mistakes made by the previous administration without recognizing that it's already a new game.
	America was already there.
	And by trying to get out, you know, led to what we are seeing these days in the Middle East.
	You know, we all know where the road paved with good intentions leads.
	In this case, it led to Aleppo and genocide.
	So, it is very important that we learn from these lessons because, you know, it's now what follows Obama is a much more cynical approach.
	So, if Obama wanted to cut these deals, you know, out of his ideological beliefs that the world should change, now you may have an administration that would like to cut these deals, you know, out of very pragmatic assumptions that, you know, that could benefit People who are close to the administration.
	So, ironically, they could be pursuing the same goals but for very different, you know, purposes.
	And I think that, you know, America, as long as, you know, it remains the most powerful economy and the most powerful military force in the world, it's due to remain a leader of the free world, thus, you know, carrying these responsibilities for protecting the world order.
	from different attempts to destroy it.
	Because if America doesn't do anything, then what's going to happen to NATO?
	What's going to happen to European security?
	And now we already saw the result in Crimea.
	And definitely Putin is not going to stop in Crimea.
	And he's now willing to have a great bargain with Trump about dividing the world and eliminating all security institutions that were standing on its way to global dominance.
	So I think it's very important that America, you know, recovers its integrity as a global power and will come up with a view of the foreign policy, which is, by the way, you saw it in these elections, It's somehow an extension of domestic policy or other way around.
	And to stop, you know, changing these policies, you know, from elections to elections.
	Because from Harry Truman to Ronald Reagan, and that's what I argued in the book, American foreign policy was quite consistent.
	There were some modifications, but basically all presidents, Democrats and Republicans, they knew what was America's role in the world.
	And again, disagreements, they were, you know, within reach.
	Now, since 1991, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, we saw American foreign policy working more like a pendulum, switching from one side to another.
	You have Clinton, who did little, then W, who did too much, then Obama, who did almost nothing, and then now it goes to Trump, who can do whatever.
	Nobody can predict.
	And it's quite interesting that when you look at the all presidents, you know, were elected, you know, since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War in the last 25 years, I think it's the first time in American history that the four presidents that were elected Clinton, Bush, Obama and Trump, they had no foreign policy expertise and very little sort of national exposure.
	OK, Trump had it, but it's not political.
	So it's interesting that, you know, it's the It seems that if Americans are looking for something else, you know, so the country, you know, didn't want to hear about big problems and wanted just to, you know, have a comfortable life.
	Let's enjoy.
	And now we reach the point, you know, after these elections that, you know, it's time to define America's role in the world.
	And I don't believe that the United States has a chance to stay away and just to isolate since, you know, the world, you know, has changed.
	And very much under American influence and walking away means that, you know, you will have to come back.
	But, but when it happens, it will be already under the terms of your enemies.
	Yeah.
	That final point is really worth reflecting on because to retreat and to ignore the world's problems when we alone among nations have this disproportionate potential influence.
	To let genocides happen, you know, especially in the case of, you know, we draw a red line and our bluff gets called and then we do nothing.
	That kind of weakness is really provocative.
	And as you say, then once we're dragged back into involvement, it's on the terms that are now on the ground.
	You know, the pieces on the board, to use your analogy, have moved and we're in a worse position.
	And so let's talk about the position we're in with respect to Putin at this point, because it seems to me, and you make this point as well, that he's running a very clever dictatorship.
	It's a dictatorship that, for those who don't want to see it as one, seems to be justified by a high level of support, he holds elections, and he's managed to sanitize his reputation By being taken seriously as a statesman on the world stage.
	And again, you point this out many times, that American, many American and European administrations are culpable for this.
	So this policy of engagement with Putin has given him a free pass to do more or less whatever he's wanted.
	And of course, this all has been facilitated by a rise in oil prices.
	But Putin seems like quite a sinister figure.
	How bad is he?
	It's very bad.
	And he's getting worse.
	But, you know, we have to give him credit.
	And you're right, you know, pointing out at his strengths and his ability to manipulate both domestically and internationally.
	He started in, you know, in the beginning of this century.
	So as a president of Russia.
	So whether he had an idea of turning his rule into dictatorship, I don't know.
	But he was an opportunist.
	And he suddenly saw big opportunities.
	Oil prices, you know, were rising.
	So giving him, you know, a limited amount of cash.
	And also he just recognized that there was a lot of goodwill on the other side.
	So he could play games with George W. Bush.
	It was an amazing, you know, psychological game when they met in June 2001.
	And Putin told him a story about, you know, hiding, you know, cross, you know, while, you know, being in a KGB school.
	So because he was baptized by his grandmother or whatever.
	I mean, it's obviously it's a fake story, but, you know, he he made it was a perfect calculation for George W. That was a story that always, you know, caught, you know, caused him to cry because it was about religion.
	So just about affection.
	About Putin's connection to religion.
	And he built a very strong psychological contact with George W., who, after his meeting, said that he looked into Putin's eyes and saw his soul.
	So that was a big victory.
	And Putin strengthened his ties with George W. by being the first leader calling after 9-11 immediately, recognizing that that was a moment where he could have Bush on his side for many years to come.
	So he was very good in building these relations and looking for friends because at that time he needed friendship from the Western leaders to neutralize any opposition in Russia.
	And I remember in 2006 when Putin was hosting the G8 meeting in St.
	Petersburg and I was always reluctant to call it G8 because G7 stood for seven great industrial democracies and Russia was neither democracy nor industrial power.
	But Putin, you know, was there, you know, actually Yeltsin was the first one to be invited, like an advance payment for immature Russian democracy.
	And Putin fully capitalized on his position of being one of the members of G8.
	And it was his turn in 2006 to host it.
	And it was a phenomenal PR success for Putin because Russian television, you know, was showing these meetings from every angle.
	And, you know, they say that, you know, a picture is more powerful than a thousand words, but Putin had both the picture and a thousand words.
	And how could people like myself or late Boris Nemtsov, how could we convince even, you know, liberal minded Russians that Putin was not a Democrat?
	Putin was not recognized as a democratic elected leader, while every other leader of the free world was there, you know, to greet him as one of the equals.
	So Putin, by using this, you know, by using this game, Putin totally neutralized opposition in Russia.
	And as you pointed out, you know, created an image of, you know, of a ruler that was not probably, you know, a true Democrat.
	But, you know, he was not one to fear, not one who could, you know, who could destroy, you know, democratic institutions.
	And that's why his decision to stay behind Medvedev when he, following constitution, he had to step down, but he stayed, you know, as a prime minister, and we all in Russia knew that it was, you know, he was a puppet master who was pulling the strings.
	It, you know, it caused some kind of an illusion for Europe and for the United States, where politicians, political leaders believed that they could play Medvedev against Putin, and eventually they could see some kind of A peaceful transition of Russia from Putin's, you know, as they thought, slightly authoritarian regime, into something more democratic.
	Not recognizing that Putin was buying time to strengthen his grip on power, and eventually he would come back as the all-powerful dictator, as it happened in 2012.
	And then, as every dictator, you know, he had to change gears, because if he needed friends in the beginning, of his rule eventually he needs enemies because at certain time he realized that all economic resources that could generate steady growth of um russian gdp and and more important um steady improvement of leading standards for the russians
	these resources have been you know have been wiped out by the lower oil prices and also by the aging infrastructure and by endemic corruption so So economy was no longer serving Putin and he needed something else to legitimize his endless staying power.
	And as every dictator, he turned for foreign aggression.
	As we warned from the beginning, saying Putin was our problem, eventually it will be everybody's problem.
	Because this is the way dictatorship works.
	And it was amazing that Americans and Europeans I didn't want to see the rise of anti-American, anti-Western propaganda on Russian television.
	And since 2012, it became a staple of Putin's domestic propaganda to blast America for anything that happens in the world and to present Russia as the besieged fortress of good surrounded by global evil.
	By the way, they use this language.
	Right, right.
	Is it true that the level of anti-Americanism in Russia now is the worst it's ever been?
	Look, maybe it was worse in the 40s and the 50s.
	I don't know.
	But it's definitely the worst in my lifetime.
	And I can rely on my mother's comments.
	She's turning 80 next March.
	So she was born under Stalin.
	And of course, you know, propaganda machine was, you know, different because, you know, there was no television.
	There was only radio and then, you know, primitive TV.
	It's hard to compare to these days.
	But she said that, you know, by listening to Russian media today, she couldn't help but thinking that while Soviet propaganda was, you know, was very intense and it was brainwashing, but it was still about bright future.
	So Soviet propaganda tried to present something that is more, you know, It's more positive, something futuristic that could make a great deal of difference for everybody.
	So they talked about, of course it was false talk, but still they talked about, you know, communist brotherhood, you know, generations ahead of us.
	And about, you know, competition between socialism and capitalism and about socialism, you know, so gaining ground.
	So there was some kind of a competition about fighting for the better future of humanity.
	Putin's propaganda is more like cult of death.
	So Russia has no allies.
	It's all about, you know, Putin defending Russia against global evil.
	It's, you know, we all maybe have to die, you know, but it's the language is so poisoning.
	And my mother says it's depressing.
	It is so depressing.
	And, you know, because of modern technology, it comes, you know, as we say in Russia, from every kettle.
	So it's from everywhere.
	So and it's 24 7.
	And and this propaganda, which, you know, just it's it's follows oral rules that, you know, it should be total lie.
	So it's not just, you know, you know, some truth, some lies.
	But it's basically, you know, it's as white as black, you know, war is peace, you know, freedom of slavery.
	So it's totally reversing the facts.
	And if it's so intense as it is now, you know, it works.
	And it works way beyond Russia now, because we could see polls in some European countries where people, you know, ordinary people in these countries, they are just buying the Putin versions of the events in Ukraine, in the Middle East and elsewhere.
	What's the significance of his being a former KGB figure?
	President Bush Sr.
	ran the CIA, and I've never heard it said of him that that made him somehow nefarious by definition.
	Obviously, there's a false moral equivalence here, but this is the way many people would think about it.
	How do you think about his KGB past?
	Yeah, but you mentioned this false moral equivalence.
	I mean, KGB is an organization that, you know, that I believe, you know, was criminal from day one.
	It was built by Lenin and his associates, you know, to destroy whatever, you know, was left of freedom in Russia.
	And it had a history of going after political opponents of the regime.
	And, you know, it's one of the most And Putin in 1999, while being still a prime minister, when he spoke at the meeting of KGB officers at the headquarter in Lubyanka Square, he said, once KGB is always KGB.
	And you couldn't say it's better.
	It's a recognition of the fact that, you know, he never, you know, betrayed his organization.
	And he always believed that, you know, they had some kind of rights, you know, to rule the country and just to... Basically, they were always above the law.
	So if we are talking about Bush 41, who was head of CIA, you know, he was still a civilian.
	And even as a head of CIA, you know, he knew that he was under some kind of supervision of the of the legislation and the president.
	So there were many things that, you know, and still hopefully there in America, you know, that guarantee checks and balances.
	So it's, you can hardly imagine, you know, one institution in the United States, you know, going just, you know, totally wild.
	So it's probably, you know, we'll still have to see the resilience of US democracy in the years to come.
	But, you know, in the Soviet Union, it was the opposite.
	So the KGB was always above the law.
	So it's this whole idea that the organization was the law itself.
	And while today we're looking at Putin's actions, I always warn people that, you know, you should remember about his true nature.
	He's a KGB guy.
	So that's why, you know, while he's not He's not alien to the idea of using force.
	He can decimate cities.
	He can order carpet bombing.
	He can order genocide.
	But at the same time, he always prefers to deal with more clandestine methods.
	So just looking for kind of hybrid wars and every opportunity to buy favors, to blackmail people, to have a covert operation.
	And the fact is that his reputation is still quite sanitized, as you just said a few minutes ago, worldwide.
	It's a result of these operations that have been heavily funded by Putin and well-designed adjusting to the certain specifics of different countries and regions.
	Do you think there's any truth to the rumor that he might be the richest person on earth at this moment?
	I think we should, you know, we should first agree on the definition of the richest person on earth because, you know, if you...
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