Unfortunately you have to know a bit of Russian to pick up on this, but if you watch/read Russian media for a while it becomes obvious how this paragraph is a comical bit of hypocrisy.
The Russians in general and Putin in particular talk all the time about how the Russian soul is exceptional, how Russia is somehow different from western democracies and has its own unique (and largely mystical) economic and political path, how you can't understand it with intellect and can only believe in it (which is a classic bit of Russian poetry internalized by pretty much everyone), and how the Russians are somehow more "spiritual" than everyone else.
Putin has the knack for coming off as fairly reasonable to the western audience, but to someone who was born and raised in the former Soviet Union this reads like something from the Onion.
EDIT: here is a specific example to illustrate my point. In a recent interview, here is how Putin characterized the difference between the American and Russian "soul". He brought up a quote by the main heroine from Gone with the Wind where she said "I can't imagine what it would be like to be hungry all the time". Putin then pointed out that something like this is a primary concern of an American soul (implying base concerns for physical comforts), while this wouldn't be a concern for the Russian soul, which allegedly is concerned with much more important spiritual matters.
This isn't an isolated example -- this happens all the time. Going on NYT and criticizing american exceptionalism seems incredibly hypocritical to me.
EDIT2: I also feel compelled to point out either the sleaziness or sloppy thinking (you decide which one) of taking a single character from a work of fiction and extrapolating it to a conclusion about an entire people (of course in service of "proving" that Americans are far baser people than the Russians).