1. Mishchenko coming in last was a total shock to me. Once again, it confirmed the idea that things look very different from the stage than they do from the audience. For me personally, Mishchenko was a real discovery. I knew absolutely nothing about him before. I completely disagree with Olshansky’s assessment of him. If he works on himself a bit and drops all the obvious nonsense about 300 million in twenty years, he’ll come across very, very well. Maybe his low result was due to the fact that the “patriotic” part of the audience had already been won over by Shargunov. 2. Shargunov was terrific. Grand, but without overdoing it. Sharp reactions and a sense of humor. He would have been the perfect opponent for Sobchak. I’m really sorry he lost that opportunity—and that we were deprived of that spectacle. 3. Masha. The “Glory to Russia” line was just excellent. She should have built on that success and gone after the patriots, stripping them of their monopoly on love for Russia. ...but, strangely enough, she completely blew the response to the simple question, “Why do you hate our country?” Anyone with the surname “Gaidar” should know the answer to that question like the Lord’s Prayer. On substance, she was the best of them all, which is no surprise. Her overall grasp of political and economic issues is far above the others’. 4. Yashin. He shouldn’t have been rocking in his chair and acting like he didn’t care. Though to be fair, he was half-dead after getting off the train. The bit about legalizing drugs was a VERY RISKY move. It’s actually strange that people aren’t bringing it up much today. It really could become a theme for attacking him going forward. But his reflexes, of course, are among the best.