The most important excerpt (at 4:24):
Max Boot (ending a long statement): The striking thing to me is that, although he's willing to threaten North Korea, he's willing to threaten Iran, he never threatens Russia and that's why a lot of intelligence officials think that there is something highly suspect in the relationship between Putin and Trump.
Stephen Cohen: I have no idea what Mr Boot is talking about. he wants Trump to threaten Russia? Why would we threaten Russia? You've got two nuclear super powers...
Max Boot (interrupting, Cohen continues because of lag): Because they're attacking us, Russia is attacking us, professor Cohen. Russia is attacking us right now, according to Trump's own director of national intelligence.
Stephen Cohen: I've been studying Russia for 45 years. I've lived in Russia and I've lived here...
Max Boot (interrupting again, while Cohen continues because of lag): And you've been consistently a Russia apologist for 45 years.
Stephen Cohen: Russia hasn't att... Excuse me? What did you say to me?
Max Boot: I said you've been consistently an apologist for Russia in those last 45 years.
Stephen Cohen: I don't do defamation of people. I do serious analysis of serious international security problems. When people like you call people like me, and not only me, but people more eminent than me, an apologist for Russia , because we don't agree with your analysis, you are criminalizing diplomacy and détente, and you are the threat to American national security in this story. Why do you have to defame somebody you don't agree with? They used to do that in the old Soviet Union. We don't do that here. Well, we used to, but we need to stop it.
Anderson Cooper: So, finally, Stephen, you're saying Russia was not attacking the United States?
Stephen Cohen: I know what you're talking about: during the 2016 election Russia attacked the United States. Yes, I don't think they attacked the United States.
Max Boot (interrupting yet again): You just denied being an apologist for Russia, you're apologizing for Russia as we speak.
Stephen Cohen: Well, you didn't let me finish, you don't know what I'm going to say. The meddling began, Mr Cooper, the meddling began right after the Russian Revolution, when Woodrow Wilson sent American troops to fight in the Russian civil war.
Max Boot (interrupting yet again): Oh, please.
Stephen Cohen: The meddling began on the Soviet and Russian side - let me finish - when the communists formed the Communist International in 1919. Ever since then Moscow has meddled in our politics, we have meddled in theirs. This is low-level stuff what went on, it is not an attack. It is not 911. It is not Pearl Harbor. It is not Russian paratroopers descending on Washington. This kind of hyperbole, an attack on America, suggests we need to attack Russia. So, you've got Mr Boot saying that Trump should threaten Russia? With what does he want to attack?
Max Boot (interrupts yet again): Try sanctions.
What an absolute piece of work that Max Boot is. I've read up on the guy. There's your fascist right there. What a lowlife. How does a warmongering neocon like this get to go on CNN and write for the Washington Post? How is that even possible? And you think Trump is the problem? This goes so much deeper.
Kudos to Stephen Cohen for keeping his cool and replying like he did.