A small moment from last night’s debate between Clinton and Obama. (Or, perhaps more accurately, between Clinton and Tim Russert.)

WILLIAMS: Let’s go from domestic to foreign affairs and Tim Russert.

RUSSERT: Before the primary on Tuesday, on Sunday, March 2, there’s an election in Russia for the successor to President Putin. What can you tell me about the man who’s going to be Mr. Putin’s successor?

CLINTON: Well, I can tell you that he’s a hand-picked successor, that he is someone who is obviously being installed by Putin, who Putin can control, who has very little independence, the best we know. You know, there’s a lot of information still to be acquired. That the so-called opposition was basically run out of the political opportunity to wage a campaign against Putin’s hand-picked successor, and the so-called leading opposition figure spends most of his time praising Putin. So this is a clever but transparent way for Putin to hold on to power, and it raises serious issues about how we’re going to deal with Russia going forward.

I have been very critical of the Bush administration for what I believe to have been an incoherent policy toward Russia. And with the reassertion of Russia’s role in Europe, with some of the mischief that they seem to be causing in supporting Iran’s nuclear ambitions, for example, it’s imperative that we begin to have a more realistic and effective strategy toward Russia. But I have no doubt, as president, even though technically the meetings may be with the man who is labeled as president, the decisions will be made by Putin.

RUSSERT: Who will it be? Do you know his name?

CLINTON: Medvedev — whatever.

RUSSERT: Yes.

A gotcha question, to be sure, so we shouldn’t get too riled up that Clinton, nor Obama, didn’t know that Dmitri Medvedev is also the Chairman of the Board of Gazprom, the national gas company which is an arm of Russian foreign policy these days. (He also goes a long way back with Putin to their St. Petersburg days.)

What I noted in trying to pronounce the name, the transcript above notwithstanding, Clinton pronounced it “Medvedeva.”

In Russia, feminine names end in -a. So, in a sense Clinton called Medvedev a girly man.