Meeting Medvedev

Well, today was busy. Big Guy is still dining, I think, and Michelle is still showing off her biceps, but I wanted to fill you in on the big meeting of the day.

The meeting with Medvedev went exceedingly well. Big Guy was able to handle the Russian I was scrolling without much difficulty. But it all felt kind of weird in the meeting. It turned out that Medvedev was a living, breathing Potemkin village. He'd shown all of the materials and pre-cleared everything with Vladimir Putin, so there wasn't that much to talk about. Secretary of State Dick Holbrooke and his assistant Hillary joked that after meeting Medvedev, we knew what it was like for other leaders to meet Joe Biden.

I'm really looking forward to seeing Moscow in July, which is really just a way of saying I'm glad we're not seeing Moscow in January.