I managed to beat Donald Trump by spending more time in the company of Vladimir Putin. Well, sort of. Over the weekend, the US president sat with Mr Putin in Hamburg for a two-hour meeting. I, on the other hand, listened to Mr Putin for four hours while lounging on my sofa, watching Oliver Stone’s lavish documentary on the Russian leader.
The strange infatuation that Mr Trump has with President Putin encouraged speculation of Manchurian candidate-like connections. After their first meeting, the attraction appears to have been reinforced. Not only did Mr Trump proclaim that it was “time to move forward” from Russia’s attempts to interfere in the US presidential election, he also revealed that the two leaders had discussed an “impenetrable cyber security unit” to prevent hacking, an improbable idea that received much deserved ridicule.
Mr Stone is afflicted with a similar crush on the Russian strongman. Over hours of filming, the interviewer and the president walk through multiple Kremlin offices, feed horses, watch hockey and sit through a screening of Dr Strangelove. They discuss everything from Mr Putin’s family to nuclear disarmament, military intervention in Georgia, Ukraine and Syria, and hacking the US election.