Putin-Republican (Tea Party for sure)
I don't really see Putin as a true Tea Party believer (or even Constitution Party member), since he's probably too smart for that kind of thing. He may
pretend to be smypathizing with the Tea Party, but that would just be a means to an end to advance his own political ambitions.
A hardline neocon in the mold of Cheney or Rumsfeld would have been a better analogue to Putin. Except that neocons have become a dying breed in America. So maybe he's an ex-neocon who's pandering to the Tea Party for strictly opportunistic reasons.
