MR. KOJO NNAMDIFrom WAMU 88.5 at American University in Washington, welcome to "The Kojo Nnamdi Show," connecting your neighborhood with the world. Later in the broadcast, restaurant etiquette and the power lunch, which fork, who pays, whether it's ever OK to order alcohol at a business lunch, but first, America's foreign aid agency is expelled from Russia. Since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. Agency for International Development has provided more than $2 billion to Russia, including money and technical support for human rights groups and democracy activists.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIBut last week, the Russian Foreign Ministry told the State Department its money and its aid agency were no longer welcome in the country. Russian President Vladimir Putin has cracked down hard on democracy groups, portraying them as tools of the West meddling in domestic affairs. The government has passed laws requiring all Russian NGOs to register as foreign agents if they receive any funds from abroad.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIBut the decision to target and expel the American agency is being interpreted by some as a slap in the face to Washington. Joining us now by phone is David Kramer, president of Freedom House. David Kramer, thank you for joining us.

MR. DAVID KRAMERPleasure. Thanks for having me.

NNAMDIDavid, this is really the second step in a crackdown on NGOs that conduct election monitoring or democracy advocacy. Earlier this year, the Russian parliament passed a law requiring that all NGOs that receive funding from abroad identify themselves as foreign agents. Here, we have a very public move against an American agency. What's going on?

KRAMERThis is part of a crackdown, Kojo, that we've been seeing since Putin's formal return to the presidency in May. He had been president, as you recall, from 2000 to 2008, stepped aside, became prime minister while Dmitri Medvedev occupied the presidential seat and then returned after elections that were widely criticized and over which tens of thousands of Russians protested.

KRAMERHe has, since his return in May, been watching this crackdown against nongovernmental organizations, as you've indicated, with legislation that would use a Soviet-era term that would brand them as foreign agents, a very pejorative term that none of them wants to use. He's cracked down on protesters, significantly increased fines against participation in what are deemed illegal protests. He's going after the Internet.

KRAMERHe is doing a number of things, including using brutal force against people, raiding the homes of critics and opposition figures, even investigating their parents, their spouses. This is part of a broader crackdown we're seeing in Russia. Unfortunately, this latest step with the U.S. Agency for International Development was announced not by the Russians but by the U.S. government yesterday. And this is part of Putin's effort to kick out foreign funding for Russian civil society because he deems it as a threat, that it's trying to fund revolutionary activity.

NNAMDIWell, Freedom House is not a government organization. It is an NGO. Talk a little bit about what Freedom House does in relationship to democracy in Russia.

KRAMERSure. We do receive U.S. government funding for what we do, though. As you rightly point out, we're a nongovernmental organization. We are the oldest human rights organization in the United States, founded in 1941. And we conduct programming advocacy work and analysis, including producing reports that rank countries on whether they're free, partly free, not free. In the case of Russia, we don't have a physical presence in Russia, but we have provided support to Russian NGOs to help them with outreach to the regions so that they're not simply Moscow- or St. Petersburg-focused.

KRAMERAnd the concern we have is that our activities, as well as the activities of a number of other American organizations that do have a physical presence in Russia, as well as Russia organizations themselves, are really going to be in jeopardy.

NNAMDIOur guest is David Kramer. He is president of Freedom House. You can join the conversation by calling 800-433-8850. How do you interpret the expulsion of USAID from Russia and American relations with Russia more broadly? 800-433-8850. You can send email to kojo@wamu.org. David Kramer, since the end of the Cold War, the American government has given billions of dollars to Russia in foreign assistance. However, this current year gave about, oh, $50 million, a relatively small sum. How significant was that?

KRAMERWell, we have to keep in mind that Russia is a country with the third largest hard currency reserves in the world after China and Japan. Russia should be able to fund this kind of activity on its own. But the main point of continuing U.S. assistance is to provide support to Russian civil society so that they have a say in the future of their country. The Russian government has shown little interest in supporting and funding activities and efforts that would benefit the average Russian citizen.

KRAMERCorruption in Russia is a massive problem, and so U.S. funding has supported anti-corruption initiatives, the support for human rights organizations, democracy organizations. But there's even been support for improving public health, for raising environmental awareness. And what Putin has done in his request to the U.S. government, which, unfortunately, the U.S. government willingly accepted, is to say we don't want anymore of your support, anymore of your money.

KRAMERWithout foreign funding, without support from the U.S., as well as some other Western sources, some of these Russia NGOs will simply go out of business because Russian funding for them is virtually impossible to come by.

NNAMDIHow about Putin's charge that some of these funds were being used to support local political organizations? Is there a legitimate case to be made that USAID supported organizations whose goal was to influence elections?

KRAMERNo. U.S. funding does not go to influence elections. It does has supported in the past organizations, including an organization called GOLOS that tries to monitor elections to ensure that they're free and fair. They don't pick sides. They don't pick favorites. They don't try to support one candidate or party over another. What Putin is doing is to try to scapegoat the West and in particular the United States.

KRAMERHe wants to be able to blame outside powers for the problems that Russia is facing. He wants to say -- his support is dwindling, by the way. It's still pretty significant, but his ratings have been in decline. He wants to scapegoat the West and say they're a threat to us therefore you have to trust me in how I want to govern things.

NNAMDIDid the letter that was sent to the State Department specify what rules USAID was breaking, and do we know whether USAID was given any warning or opportunity to address those claims?

KRAMERI haven't seen the letter itself. The letter was delivered last week and it also -- this issue came about when Sec. Clinton was in Vladivostok in the Far East in Russia for the APEC meeting that she attended. And at that meeting, reports indicate the foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, of Russia conveyed a message from Putin to her as saying he wanted USAID out of Russia. There had been a bilateral agreement under which USAID was operating in Russia that expired two years ago.

KRAMERAnd so this I imagine is being cited as one of the grounds. The other reason that the Russian apparently have given is that they have said they are rich enough. They don't need support. They're a donor nation now, not a recipient nation. And so they view that this is unseemly for a country of their stature at least as they see it.

NNAMDINot only are they no longer a recipient nation and a donor nation but in the view of at least one presidential candidate, Vladimir Putin's Russia is our top geopolitical adversary, and the Russian Foreign Ministry has some interesting things to say in its announcement about the expulsion. It said that Russian civil society has become fully mature and does not need any external direction. Do you think that the notion of the United States as a top geopolitical adversary for Russia is what Putin is looking at here?

KRAMERWe have to keep in mind that Putin years back in 2004 after a terrible hostage situation in Beslan, soon after it accused outside powers to trying to take a piece of Russia. In 2007, at a speech in Munich, he cited the United States in particular as a threat to Russia, including through NATO expansion in missile defense. A few months later, he compared the United States to the Third Reich. For Putin, blaming the United States and accusing it of being a threat is part and parcel of the way he operates.

KRAMERRussian NGOs in some cases can operate without foreign funding, but there is strong deterrent messages coming from the Russian government to any Russian businesses or philanthropist to the extent that they exist in Russia to supporting Russian organizations engaged in human rights work and democracy work that kind of work Putin views is a threat to him because he does not believe in democracy. He does not respect human rights, and so those kinds of organizations, if they're funded from outside, are by definition in his mind a threat.

NNAMDIBut it is -- is it possible that there's also an ideological side to this that Putin seems to view Russia as a great power and he doesn't like the idea of another rival power meddling in his backyard? Do you think that's what his view might be?

KRAMERSure. There's an element to that, and during his presidency from 2000 to 2008 thanks to the massive increase from the price of oil Russia's economy did rise. There's no question about it. It wasn't what mostly to any economic reform that he launched but to the increase in price of energy, of oil. So Russia has gained in prominence in the economic realm. But in terms of a superpower that it used to be as the Soviet Union, Russia is no more.

KRAMERAnd as we've seen in the case of Syria, even in the case of Iran, Russia has isolated itself as a major player. Its position on Syria is one that I find hard to defend and understand. They're supporting and abetting a murderous regime in Hafez al-Assad and defying the international community in trying to bring about an end to the horrible bloodshed there. In the case of Iran, they've been a player in trying to negotiate a resolution there, but they haven't done very much to be perfectly honest and have sold arms to both regimes, by the way. It's important to keep in mind.

KRAMERSo Russia doesn't just sit idly by and where it doesn't sit and support us in a number of areas. Russia is, in fact, a challenge to us. And I think it's important to recognize that.

NNAMDIWhat does this say about American-Russian relations? President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton famously called for a reset with Russia after relations deteriorated during the Bush administration. Do we need a reset of the reset?

KRAMERI think it's already happened. I think it happened even as recently as 2010 after the New START arms control agreement was signed. And I think since then, we've seen a slow down in the development of relations and more recently particularly with Putin's return a deterioration in relations. The human rights situation in Russia has gotten worse. We, in my view, have not done enough to bring attention to that problem.

KRAMERThe Russian pressure on neighbors continues. The Georgians, of course, were invaded in 2008. Russia is pressuring Belarus and Kazakhstan to form an alliance. It's doing the same with Ukraine. Russia meddles in other countries' affairs in ways that we would view detrimental to our interests.

NNAMDIIn addition to which you mentioned Iran and Syria and I mentioned that a presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, has declared that Russia is the United States' top geopolitical adversary. That claim has been questioned by many Democrats and others in the foreign policy establishment. What do you think about it?

KRAMERI think it inflates the importance of Russia to be perfectly honest. We can do things in the case of Syria or Iran without relying on the Russians. So we discovered hoping for a Russian vote in the U.N. Security Council on Syria has proven to be a fruitless endeavor. I think that claim inflates the importance of Russia, and, frankly, we should and can find ways to work around Russia where Russia simply won't be a cooperative partner.

KRAMERHaving said that, Russia has been supportive of efforts in Afghanistan, and that's because Russia has strong interest in seeing Afghanistan stabilize. A lot is made of the transit through Russian territory for Afghan efforts, but it's not as if they're giving this to us for free. We actually pay them a fee to use Russian territory for transiting.

KRAMERThe New START agreement, frankly, was a pretty modest arms control agreement. It's not to say that the reset was a total failure. I think the main criticisms I have would be that the Obama administration has oversold its successes, has ignored the human rights deterioration inside Russia and has not paid enough attention to Russia's neighbors.

NNAMDIDo you think that portends a more confrontational relationship with Russia in our foreign policy future?

KRAMERPresident Obama and President Medvedev were able to establish a decent rapport between them. President Obama, in fact, met with or spoke to Medvedev more than any other leader while Medvedev was president. He is not going to strike up and has not been able to strike up the same kind of relationship with Putin. And whether he's reelected or Mitt Romney is elected, I can't imagine that there will be warm and fuzzy relationship between the American and Russian leaders.

NNAMDIDavid Kramer, thank you for joining us.

KRAMERPleasure. Thanks for having me.

NNAMDIDavid Kramer is president of Freedom House. We're going to take a short break. When we come back, restaurant etiquette and the power lunch, which fork, who pays, whether it's ever OK to order alcohol at a business lunch. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.