„When I asked the young human rights activist whether she perceived any substantive difference between Russia's genial president and its surly prime minister, there was an almost imperceptible sigh. 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. Whatever she may have been thinking, the activist did not respond rudely to my question. "I know people here see the difference," she said after only a short pause, "but I'm not sure. Because all the time it's the same. Putin made declarations after Yeltsin, but it was the same. Medvedev makes declarations, but it's the same. In Chechnya, in Russia, nothing has changed. ... If I don't see results, I don't see the difference."
Obama's "reset" of relations with Russia has produced concrete, practical results, administration officials believe: The the signing of a major arms control treaty; Russia's backing of a U.N. resolution imposing sanctions on Iran; permission to transport cargo through Russia to the war theater in Afghanistan; and this month, the quietly unwinding on mutually beneficial terms spy scandal.”