You know RT, that news network you see shared on Facebook and Twitter, the one all your cool anti-establishment friends who get their news from alternative sources are always sharing? It's 100 percent Russian propaganda. It's young, it's digital, its content is ready to go viral, and it's all Russian bullshit devised to trick you into thinking it's an independent news source. It exists to make citizens of nations out of Russia's reach think that Putin has all the answers, and that their own country has no idea how to run itself.

Putin knows how to spread his message so effectively and so loudly that it drowns out all conflicting voices. Which is surprisingly subtle, considering how he usually just kills people who disagree with him. To whit ...

The most famous of their poisoning murders also happened in 2006. Alexander Litvinenko's death made global headlines. He was a former KGB agent who got a little too lippy. He publicly accused Putin of ordering the murder of Politkovskaya. He was to be prosecuted in a Russian court when he received political asylum from the UK. On November 1, 2006, he drank tea laced with polonium-210 and died of radiation poisoning three weeks later. The other audacious crime Litvinenko publicly accused Putin of perpetrating was the 1999 bombings of Moscow apartment buildings which killed 293 Russian citizens.

Maxim Marmur/Getty Images

Putin rode the wave of that bombing's anger to victory when he was running for office. The whole thing was blamed on Chechen terrorists. The bombing was used as grounds for the Second Chechen War. Litvinenko wasn't the only one who felt this way. Authors who've deeply studied the ins and outs of the Russian intelligence communities think so, and American conservative think tanks think so as well. A lot of Russians themselves also believe that Putin and his former KGB buddies ordered the attack on Russian citizens so they could use its patriotic anger as a distraction from Russia's problems and score an easy win for a candidate who wanted to see Russia's glorious return to its Soviet days.

Beneath Putin's icy exterior is a softy who's nostalgic for the good ol' days. Back when things were simpler. Back when Russia had an iron grip on a bunch of nations it refused to release until the union collapsed and they all moved on with their lives. Everyone except for Putin, who to this day fantasizes that the former Soviet countries will give him and Russia another shot.

According to polls, more than half of Russian citizens yearn for the glory days of the USSR, a time when they were living under a totalitarian regime and were unable to speak freely and had their friends and family arrested randomly by secret police and thrown in gulags. The weird part is, I get why they'd feel that way.

After the USSR fell, Russia tried to reshape itself into a democracy, and it failed spectacularly. The ruble went to shit, Russia's oligarchy had no interest in helping shape a market economy, and the people in power just couldn't manage to craft a functioning democracy. Putin was among those unhappy about suddenly having to give citizens freedom instead of an icy stare and a solemn promise from the bottom of his heart to help them go fuck themselves. Once he got elected and ensured he would be president until further notice, he made it his mission to let former Soviet nations know he was coming for them. It started when he stole Crimea from Ukraine. Since then, fear has spread throughout the rest of the nearby former Soviet nations. And it's all at least mostly because of NATO.

Every former Soviet country either is or wants to be a part of NATO, the global alliance that includes the U.S. and Great Britain that ensures that if any of its member nations are attacked by outsiders, every other member will help. Putin loathes NATO. They represent a coalition of liberal Western ideologies that Putin hates on principle (more on that later). To the former Soviet countries, NATO represents being a part of a global community of big brothers who can be called on to stop Russia from bullying them. Meanwhile, Putin is playing the role of the jealous ex-boyfriend who needs a restraining order slapped on him because he keeps showing up at his ex's house holding a knife.

Bubbers13/iStockPhotos "Lithuania! Funny story, I think I left my keys at your place 30 years ago. Think I can pop in to have a look around?"

Russian aggression is why people in Georgia feel like they're about to be invaded any second now. It's why Lithuania called in NATO troops to help secure their borders. It's why Latvia has been ramping up their military exercises to prepare their soldiers for the invasion they're certain is just around the corner. It's why one of NATO's top military commanders told Moldova to watch out, because after Ukraine, they're probably next. Putin has them all in his sights, and they all know it.

So excuse me for thinking the guy's full of shit when he says he doesn't want to reform the Soviet Union. In 2005, he gave a speech in which he lamented the fall of the USSR, calling it a "major political disaster of the century." He then followed that up by spending the next 10 years either invading or threatening to invade every former Soviet nation.

For Putin and Russia, it's not just about attaining power and land; it's about regaining the self-esteem that power and land brought with it. It's a confidence Russia lost when the Soviet Union fell. Putin is an international bully. And the reason Putin is such a miserable prick is that ...

Whether he's fishing for compliments using his exposed man-tits or flipping dudes in a judo class ...

AFP/Stringer/Getty Images Keep your intellectual bookworms. I prefer my leaders to be constantly trying to prove something to their unimpressed father.

... or playing hockey against Russia's super-rich to show them who's boss ...

*cue Curb Your Enthusiasm theme*

... or threatening to invade every country that looks at them funny, damn near everything Putin does is an attempt to prove he's a man. It's like if Tim Allen's caveman grunt was running a country.

Faux masculinity is at the center of it all. Russia's economy has been in shambles for years, and the only reason they're relevant is that they keep trying to destabilize the Western world with their ultraconservative horseshit. When you come out against something as intrinsic to human life as diversity, clearly the problem isn't the world. You're an angry, isolated loon.

I can make fun of Putin and his faux machismo all I want, but nothing I say will come close to being as good of a burn as when German Chancellor Angela Merkel once boiled Putin down to his sad base elements: "I understand why he has to do this - to prove he's a man ... He's afraid of his own weakness. Russia has nothing, no successful politics or economy. All they have is this."

That's all Vladimir Putin is: an ultraconservative man in his mid-60s who wishes things could be like they once were, back before everyone had autonomy. He's so terrified of a changing world that he doesn't understand that his only reaction is to lash out, punish it, and try to control it. Vladimir Putin is the world's miserable unemployed stepdad. He will not rest until you feel just as shitty about yourself as he does.

And the frightening thing is that people are actually buying into his bullshit.

Luis' next cup of tea will have a grenade in it. He'd like to thank his friend Romney Manassa for his help and expertise on the subject of Putin's fuckery. Read Romney's thoughts on global affairs over on his blog Sarvodaya. While he's still alive, follow Luis on Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook.

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On this month's live podcast, Jack O'Brien and the Cracked staff welcome Dr. Christopher Ryan, podcaster and author of Sex At Dawn, onto the show for a lively Valentine's Day discussion about love, sex, why our genitals are where they are, and why we're more like chimps and bonobos than you think.

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