Medvedev: Best Supporting Actor

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On economic policy, Medvedev has yet to distinguish himself. He enjoys the same good fortune as his predecessor, in near-record-high energy prices, a bulging budget surplus, and fat foreign currency reserves. But he faces the same challenges as well, in lagging competitiveness outside the energy industry and persistent inflation.

Olga Kryshtanovskaya, director of the Applied Policy Institute and a scholar on Russian leadership, said Putin remains a "shadow tsar" whose allies dominate the executive branch.

In a country where the ability to lead often depends on manipulating feuding factions and rewarding loyalty, only two of Medvedev's 84 cabinet members are considered "his men," Justice Minister Aleksandr Konovalov and Nikolai Vinnichenko, director of the Federal Bailiff Service.

The president has two key allies in his administration, Konstantin Chuichenko, head of the Audit Office, and Sergei Dubik, head of the State Service Office.

"There is no balance of power between President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin. Medvedev is still much weaker. He doesn't have a team of his own. He remains a member of Putin's team," Kryshtanovskaya said.

LAW AND ORDER

Some Russians hoped that Medvedev's era would bring about "a political thaw," the expression closely tied to the Khrushchev era when repressive Stalinist measures were eased.

"The president says all the right things. His statements about the courts, corruption, and the rule of law inspire hope," said former Soviet dissident Lyudmila Alekseyeva, chairwoman of the Moscow Helsinki Group, a human rights organization.

But no thaw seems forthcoming. Valery Panyushkin recently argued in the opposition magazine The New Times that the first sign of liberalization would be the release of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, but things have only gotten worse for the former oil tycoon. Sentenced in 2005 to eight years in prison for tax evasion and fraud, Khodorkovsky faces a new trial. He is accused of conspiracy to steal 892.4 billion rubles ($38 billion) worth of Yukos oil between 1998 and 2003.

Alekseyeva said the new charges against Khodorkovsky are hardly surprising. "We have been living under a duumvirate, and it's difficult to tell acts of the new president from acts of the old one."

Kryshtanovskaya, of the Applied Policy Institute, said, "Medvedev is associated with bright, optimistic expectations. But these expectations are based on what he says and nothing else."

But the new president does have some successes under this belt. Commentators credit him with ending a conflict among security agencies that broke out in late 2007 and early 2008. In October, members of the security forces arrested the then-director of the country's drug control agency, Gosnarkontrol, on corruption charges a year after his agency had investigated a smuggling ring in the Federal Security Bureau.

But there have been no new arrests after the dismissals of the Gosnarkontrol head and the Federal Security Bureau chief in May.

"Medvedev managed to settle the conflict, which Putin had been unable to handle at one time," said Aleksei Mukhin, director of the Moscow-based Center for Political Information. "This is incredible considering the ambitions of Putin's cronies."

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Another success was the July G-8 summit in Japan, a major international event in the first three months of Medvedev's presidency.

In contrast to Putin, who at the February 2007 Munich security conference accused NATO of breaking its word to Russia by moving eastward, "Medvedev succeeded in introducing gentle changes into Russia's foreign policy course," Mukhin said. "His statements were absolutely pragmatic without the Munich drama, and naturally, they generated interest in the EU and NATO."

Medvedev spoke only against the deployment of U.S. missiles in Europe. The United States plans to site missile defense elements in Poland and the Czech Republic to counter what it says is a possible threat from Iran. Medvedev persuaded the EU to begin negotiations with Russia on a new partnership agreement, something his predecessor tried unsuccessfully to do for 18 months.

Still, experts stress that the president has little autonomy in foreign policy. "The ghost of Putin haunted the G-8 summit. Everyone could see that Medvedev was speaking cautiously only about matters on which he had an agreement [with Putin]. He did not make impromptu remarks. He had to coordinate all his actions," Kryshtanovskaya said.

Interviews that Medvedev and Putin gave to foreign journalists in late May were revealing. While talking to Chinese journalists Medvedev limited his comments to bilateral economic cooperation. Putin, in an interview with the French daily Le Monde, touched on the whole spectrum of foreign policy issues, including defense, although the Russian constitution delegates matters of security and defense to the president.

The war in South Ossetia could be a test for Medvedev similar to the sinking of the Kursk nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea that marked Putin's 100th day as president in August 2000. In one way, Medvedev passed: Russia took the upper hand in the clash.

In another way, he failed. Not only did he appear dominated by Putin, but the conflict might also force him to revise his priorities, which he has hardly been a forceful champion for in any event.

"The military-political force majeure makes it impossible [for the president] to stick to his earlier-declared plan for the country's development," said Dmitry Badovsky, deputy director of the independent Institute for Social Systems think tank. Badovsky said the conflict gives the government an excuse to shift its attention from the economic reforms Medvedev professes to believe in to military mobilization and increased defense spending.

WRIT SMALL

If Medvedev's successes seem minor during this first 100 days, then so do his failures. Russians have a joke about it: Medvedev catches a magical fish and asks it to grant him three wishes — a hockey victory over Canada, a football win over the Netherlands, and victory at the Eurovision song contest. The fish complies and then asks, "Why are the wishes so strange? Presidents usually ask me to build a new capital, win a war, or expand the country." Medvedev is surprised, "Could I really ask that?"

Being the butt of jokes is an unenviable position for a president, and that implicit lack of respect shows up in other ways. Tradition requires that Russian bureaucrats hang a portrait of the current head of state in their offices. But so far, none has dared remove Putin from the wall. Some solve the problem by buying photos of Putin and Medvedev together. One store in Moscow offers six double portraits for prices ranging between 1,900 rubles ($80) for a roughly 20-by-30-centimeter image to 16,600 rubles ($700) for a roughly 65-by-90-centimeter oil on canvas.

Duma member Valery Ryazansky, deputy secretary of the ruling United Russia party's general council, said both leaders "very sensibly share their duties." He would not reveal whose portrait hangs in his office.

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