the ambassador kicked off the session by tweeting i m happy to answer your questions. at 2:30 local time, the exact same time the q&a was scheduled to start, that is when the russian government released at that very moment the news that they had arrested this american spy. the guy in the terrible wig. the exact same time. that is not only the latest in a lifetime s worth of bizarre spy stories between washington and moscow. it s also a pretty good granular indicator of what it must be like to try to be the u.s. ambassador in russia these days under a man named vladimir putin. joining us now for the interview tonight, michael mcfaul. he left his post as u.s. ambassador to russia last week. now a professor of political science at stanford university. professor mcfaul, thanks for being with us. thanks for having me. you ve done your homework about me. i ve at least tried to.
him and he didn t take that shot. gregg: thanks. martha: is russia spying on the olympic athletes in the shower? they have done thing like this before. that s one allegation in the report. tonight it s opening ceremonies. jonathan hunt joins us live. jonathon, we heard of all kind of russian spy stories through the decade really. but are they real i watching them in the showers? reporter: this was either a case of a russian official admitting to creepy spying or a case of lost in translation. obviously everybody is excited arriving in so chicago for the opening ceremonies in about an hour and 20 minutes time. but there have been all these complaints about hotels. then we have the deputy prime minister of russia holding this news conference in which he said the following.
pennsylvania man did, and 45 minutes later, he was in custody after agreeing to a facebook arranged meeting with an undercover police officer. the police shared their victory, fittingly, on their facebook page. it s the stuff of science fiction and spy stories. an eelectro magnetic pulse that can cripple everything from stoplights to computers to the defense grid. doug tells us just how real a possibility an emp is. it was a campaign promise iranian president rouhani made last may. quote, death to america is easy. we need to express death to america with action. the easiest way for some rogue state to do that, say some, would be by emp, or electromagnetic pulse. it s a burst of gamma rays. detonated at the right altitude over the u.s., an emp could fry the circuitry of electronics all over the country. that means no water. that means no food. that means no
gaming license, but few doubted he would get it. there were questions about a sinatra aide that was asked to break the legs of an opponent. he said it never happened. there were reports that he carried two million dollars to lucky luciano in 1989. i never gave mr. luciano anything. i shook hands with him in a dining room. commission chairman harry reid said a few weeks ago he would have voted against sinatra, but has changed his mind. after learning more about you as a person, i m now a sinatra a fan. after that, they agreed that the stories about him were st y stories spread by the news media. sinatra had few words for the media. i m very happy it is all over. rick davis, nbc news. it t ltle things ilife that make me
not guilty to charges he tried to join al qaeda. prosecutors say 24-year-old wen has confessed he wanted to be a trainer for the terrorist group in syria. he apparently had been there fighting as a rebel against the assad government. the judge in the case expressed some skepticism saying the suspect had no special skills that would help the terror network. france saying the nsa intercepted millions of phone calls inside that country in a 30-day period in december and last january. the documents were leaked by edward snowden. secretary of state john kerry met with his french counterpart in paris and president obama has spoken with the france leader. france leaders have called the surveillance totally unacceptable. we can expect more shocking spy stories apparently from those leaked nsa documents so says glenn greenwald, the reporting who broke the story. he says he has many more stories