If you are like us, you were following today's Russian presidential election with baited breath. And when the winner, Dmitry Medvedev, was declared, you couldn't help but gasp in surprise.

We partly kid, of course. The "baited breath" part is an outright lie; Medvedev was hand-picked by current president Putin, and it was obvious to all that he will be elected by a landslide. But we're not kidding about gasping in surprise. You see, there are rumors that Russia's president-elect is secretly a Jew.

Now, knowing Russians as well as we think we do, they love their Jewish conspiracies: since Medvedev doesn't like to delve into his family's past, there must be a secret there! Yet the best they can come up with is the name of Medvedev's maternal grandfather, Veniamin (Benjamin) Shaposhnikov, which in theory could be Jewish. It's a very very loose theory.

What we do know is that Medvedev is baptized, is in favor of increasing Eastern Orthodox education in Russia, and his last name means "bear". Possible Jewish grandpa or not, it's just not gonna fly. So there shouldn't be any gasps in surprise about the verdict below.