READING the papers these days, I find that the two world leaders who stir the most passion in me are Pope Francis and Russian President Vladimir Putin. One is everything youd want in a leader, the other, everything you wouldnt want. One holds sway over 1.2 billion Roman Catholics, the other, over nine time zones. One keeps surprising me with his capacity for empathy, the other, by how much he has become a first-class jerk and thug. But neither can be ignored, and both have an outsized influence on the world today.
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