You Americans, she seemed to be thinking. Always the same naive hope for the next Russian leader.
President Dmitry Medvedev is younger than Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and talks more often about restoring democracy and the rule of law. President Obama has settled on him, as much as possible, as the man to do business with. Students of Russia argue incessantly about whether Medvedev has power, whether he wants power or whether he is simply a more modern face of an increasingly repressive one-party state steered, as always, by the steely Putin.
