President Obama criticizes Russian state-run media

The state-run media in Russia is allowing President Vladimir Putin to get away with actions that aren’t in his country’s best interests, President Barack Obama said. “The Russian economy is taking a hammer blow because of their incursions into Ukraine. It’s terrible for the future of Russia. But because ordinary Russians aren’t getting good information, there’s no check on what Putin may do,” President Obama said. “We’re raising the costs of what he’s doing in Ukraine to incredibly high levels, where rationally they would do something different," the President continued. "But he’s not necessarily operating based on those cost-benefit analyses because right now, he’s still popular.”

The “multiplicity of voices” in US media prevents American presidents from getting away with overstepping their bounds, he added. “Obviously, if there was state-run media in the United States, whoever the President was would have the ability to make whatever screwy policies they had look good as well,” President Obama said.