I was reading Izvestia.ru and noticed that the instrumental case of our good friend Путин is Путиным! This might be an utterly silly question, but why not Путином? Isn't that the regular ending for a masculine hard consonant stem?

On a totally and completely unrelated topic. When people use Вы in a formal sense, does every adjective become plural?

as: Вы русские? vs Вы русский? (said to a male person)
The latter sounds more correct to me...

do verbs always take plural form?
вы ездили в Москву? vs. Вы ездил в Москву
The former sounds more correct to me...

What d'ya say?