Putin.

The American ruling class, for whom the NY Times is a propaganda instrument, does not care how much money autocrats steal from their citizenry or how brutally they treat individuals who challenge their authority: the Shah, Mubarak, Marcos, Pinochet don't even scratch the surface of the litany of truly terrible people the USA has installed, supported politically, and sold weapons to. So please, stop with the sanctimony with respect to Vladimir Putin. There are equally as criminal elements in the American political, military, financial, and industrial sectors of American society as he: Cheney, Rumsfeld, Kissinger, and many, many more.

What distinguishes candidates for military aid from candidates for regime change among the owners of the USA is who makes plunder easy for American corporations and who makes it hard. As usual, the NY Times is willing to risk war with Russia because the USA simply must rule every square inch of planet Earth and will not rest until it does. Every country the USA invades, every titular head it deposes, is demonized day after day, year after year by the NY Times until the deed is finally done. Then we live with the results. This is the logic of their support for Hillary Clinton to be neocon in chief. One can only hope that American aggression on Russia's borders does not result in nuclear Armageddon.