putin who is moving from being prime minister to the presidency, we assume. >> whs's on his mind? >> will, i think he's facing an unexpected situation he announced-- he announced in october that he would run for the presidency and that the current president would then become his prime minister. >> rose: medvedev. >> medvedev, reversing what was done four years earlier. and it was assumed that this was a very normal trsfer of power reflecting putin's strengths. so then they had parliamentary elections in early december. and which were conducted more or less the way other poorlymenty elections had been conducted with some influence by the government and some cooking of the vote. but it then appeared that the middle class which had been largely created as a result of putin's previous efforts protested and was totally unexpected. so there were big demonstrations in moskow and smaller ones in othe cities. that objected to the lack of transparency of the system. >> rose: they thought the elections were in some cases fraudulent. >> yes. and ey had pictures of ballots being stuffed. so th