Vladimir Putin has left Russian schoolchildren and adults baffled by his 'weird joke’ about a “rubber bum”.
He was speaking to selected high IQ pupils who had been quarantined for two weeks before being allowed face-to-face contact with the Kremlin warmonger as Covid spreads again.
As well as giving them a skewed history lesson suggesting Ukraine and Russia should be one country, and his views on the decaying West, he lectured them on the importance of discipline.
“You need to be motivated to reach your goal,” he instructed the high-flying students aged nine to 12 in Kaliningrad.
“And, of course, hard work. All this together is very important. Working hard is a talent in itself. It's not just, excuse me, a rubber bum.
“It is a talent to force oneself to work, and to be able to do it productively.”
A video shows how he found the “rubber bum” funny, laughing as he uttered the words during a teaching session supposedly dedicated to “important” themes for children.
But his bemused young audience remained silent and his words led to puzzlement on the Russian web.
One commenter said: “I am confused. I could at least understand his previous ‘jokes’.”
Another demanded: "What's behind the weird joke from our dictator?"
Journalist Elena Rykovtseva posted: “God forbid - is this what he’s flogging to school kids at the ‘Speak about the Important’ session in Kaliningrad? What kind of mess is in his head? Somebody cure this president!”
Political scientist Fyodor Krashennikov dubbed Putin simply: "Mr. Rubber Bum.”
Another said: “What was it for? What did he mean by that? What does the rubber bum have to do with the subject under discussion? Someone please explain.”
Newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets said Putin was telling pupils not to see diligence as “rubber booty”.
One guess is that he muddled his Soviet history, and was alluding to a nickname given to notorious Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov, a Bolshevik monster who personally signed off more mass execution lists than Stalin.
During Stalin times, he was known as “Stone Arse” for his ability to work at his desk for 20 hours non-stop.
But Molotov pedantically corrected comrades saying Soviet founder Lenin had in fact dubbed him "Iron Arse”.
Meanwhile, Putin admitted about himself: "I can’t say I am the most disciplined.
"It’s clear I’ve got to work on myself. Discipline is important to succeed. But discipline alone isn’t enough."
