russian economy. he's talking tough about something that happened years ago while at the same time, he's talking of letting russia off the hook by letting him back into the g8. if any viewers are wondering why did vladimir putin meddle in our election, what did he get tour it? this is what he got the atlantic alliance split and u.s. president unraveling the post world war ii order where we stand with our allies and we don't pick fights with them. and then putin mentioning he should be brought back in from the cold and i think that's the worst possible signal to be sending now. >> ben, i'm going to talk about your book in a second but right now, i want to bring in eugene scott and ali. eugene, your take away from all of this what most surprised you? >> i was asking the takeaways.