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The slowly building crisis in U.S.-Russian relations was predictable. It is largely a result of trends in Russia itself, primarily the series of counterreforms that have been adopted with increasing rapidity since mid-2012. As a result, the mildest response to that process that the Obama administration might take is not continued attempts at a "reset" but a downgrading of bilateral relations. The problem is those relations have already degenerated into scandal and skirmish, as evidenced by the U.S. Magnitsky Act and Russia's decision to ban U.S. citizens from adopting Russian children.