Now we know just how little Vladimir Putin and the government behind him cares about what the world thinks
writes
Onan Coca regarding the latest entry in the annals of the
Apologizer-in-Chief's
smart diplomacy
– and particularly what America thinks … it seems that every step the Obama administration has taken over the last 5+ years has led us to this point. Whether it was Hillary Clinton’s “Reset” button, Obama’s pledge of flexibility once the 2012 election was over, Obama’s recalcitrance on Syria, or Obama’s impotence on Iran… every foreign policy misstep has brought us down this road. In fact, I think it’s fair to say that what is happening in Eastern Europe now is as much President Obama’s fault as it is Vladimir Putin’s. 
Meanwhile,
James Rosen points out how,
among ethnic Russians, and in the heart of the former Soviet Union, a palpable anti-American sentiment is discernible -- and it is, to some extent, the product of determined efforts by Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin apparatus he controls.
No Pasarán wrote about this in October 2012 after the third debate when a New York Times piece, of all places, provided fodder for the post
Moscow's current tone is "reminiscent of Soviet days"; If anyone is stuck in the Cold War mentality, it is the Russians.
James Rosen, again:
"Friends of mine who have been in Moscow for the past, say, two years tell me you cannot understand the amount of propaganda, anti-U.S. propaganda, that is being fed to the Russian people on Russian television -- nothing like it, unprecedented," said Daniel Henninger, deputy editorial page editor of the Wall Street Journal, in an appearance on Fox News' "Happening Now." "They didn't even do this sort of thing back during the Cold War."
