As the world reels under the financial turmoil unleashed by an irresponsible mismanagement of the capitalist system. As the world enters into recession and tens of thousands of workers are laid off. As Somali pirates strut their stuff and as Barack Obama gets his team together and is jeered by al-Qaeda for not behaving like a Muslim, as if that, plus so much more, were not bad enough, Russians and the rest of the world are witnessing what everybody knew they would witness: the return of Vladimir Putin.
Return may be the wrong word, as is resurgence. For Mr Putin never gave up his power except in a constitutional sense and constitutions can be made to do whatever a strong man wants in Russia. When Mr Putin bowed to the constitutional obligation to retire from the Presidency, he knew that this would be a temporary measure. He also knew that he would be back in the Kremlin - constitutionally - and this time for more than a decade.
The man he put in his place - one need not quibble over this - was incontrovertibly a pro tem guy. He took with him to the Kremlin not an ounce of charisma, and even as commentators were wondering whether he would not, after all, be his own man, that is, put his Prime Minister - Valdimir Putin - in his place, it was time for Dmitry Medvedev to propose that the Presidential term be extended from four years to six. Mr Putin, in short, was getting impatient sitting in Parliament.
It is inconceivable that Mr Medvedev was doing what he did to lengthen his own Presidency. On the contrary, it was highly likely that, at the appropriate time, that is, at a time suitable to Mr Putin, he would step down to allow Mr Putin to return to the Kremlin.
At a superficial level, it can be argued that Mr Medvedev is staking out his own claim to 12 years in power. Those who put this argument forward ask to see how strongly he delivered his state of the union address, earlier this month, on the same day, let it be noted, that the Americans were voting Mr Obama as the next President of the United States, an event he ignored altogether. He made public Russia's intention to deploy short-range missiles on Europe's border and radio-electronic devices to paralyse America's missile-defence system. This was vintage Vladimir Putin.
As to the financial crisis, there was little in his speech to indicate that he, or his government, quite understood what had hit them. Last month, the indices of its main markets had slumped by two-thirds. It became quite common to suspend trading for days at a time, when the beneficiaries of these closures were rival stock markets; if beneficiaries they can be called in their present state of volatility.
Nobody harbours any doubt that the former President wishes to be anything but the future President. It crosses the mind of only a few that he will not take over that role, this time, for 12 years.
It was hugely unlikely that Mr Putin would back the constitutional change if there were the slightest chance that it would not be he, rather than Mr Medvedev, who would ultimately benefit from it. The thought of a man like Mr Putin sinking into the background when he was at the height of his powers in the foreground is too weird to contemplate.