[ chanting ] all of east germany, angry crowds lashed out on the streets. that night in dresden, they found a target. the local kgb headquarters. a mob surrounded the building, as the hour grew later, the crowd grew larger. inside, peering through the curtains was a young kgb lieutenant colonel named vladimir putin. he was terrified they were going to storm the building. putin was a junior officer, but the boss was away. he was in charge. the berlin wall had come down, police weren t going to help. he called for instruction. desperate for help, putin dialed kgb headquarters in moscow, over and over again. finally, one official told him simply, moscow is silent. i think it felt like a deep betrayal to him. vladimir putin was on his own. he went down into the bowels of the building and fired up the furnace. he finds himself in the basement, at a furnace shoveling documents, as he hears protests on the street. they were filing so many documents, that the furnace was
it s a moment of high drama. russia reeling over putin s sudden ascendens. a lot of things happened quitly. outside the has of the kremlin, many know nothing about him. at theal started just hours earlier. suddenly yeltsin appeared on television. boris yeltsin, the first president of democratic russia, abruptly resigned. a surprise announcement that yeltsin is resigning as president, turning over power to his prime minister, vladimir putin. it was clear yeltsin had been struggling. drinking he s barely being propped up, and physically propped up. he disappears for weeks at a time. he s obviously had heart
it. i certainly need enough time to understand the bill myself. get input from constituents. i have a hard time believing i ll have enough time by the end of next week, but primarily remember when bill clinton talked about the craziest system in the world, people bufrting it sometimes 60 hours a week and wind up with premiums doubled, coverage halved? i m concerned about those folks. i don t believe those individuals working hard, buying health care in the individual market with after-tax dollars have seen premiums doubled and tripled, not being at quitly addressed in the health care bill wah we re not addressing the root problem. driving individual market up artificially double and triple. really i want some freedom in choice allowing americans to buy health coverage that fits their needs and they can afford, and unfortunately, we ve been banging that drum the entire time. part of this discussion, prior