Politablog

Despite calls from the U.N. and West African leaders to accept election results and step down, Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo has refused to surrender power and retains control of the nation’s military forces. Nearly 200 people have been killed in post-election clashes. Gwen Ifill takes a closer look at the situation.

After the latest conviction of oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Jeffrey Brown examines political dissent, the rule of law and the legal system in Russia with Anna Vassilieva of the Monterey Institute of International Studies and Dimitri Simes of the Nixon Center, both of whom are natives of Russia but now U.S. citizens.

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson is back in New Mexico after several days in North Korea as an unofficial envoy. He says the situation is still a “tinderbox”. (Dec. 22)

Korea has been a troubled peninsula for the last century. The Japanese ruled Korea from 1910 until 1945, they implemented labor camps, stripped the land of its wealth and attempted to erase Korean language, culture, art and history. In 1945 Korea was taken over by the Soviets and the Americans with an agreement for the Soviets to stop at the 38^th parallel.

Continue Reading

It is amazing how quickly (or so it seems) that things can change. One decade we have growth, jobs, relative peace and people seemed to get along. One decade later we have economic collapse of numerous corporations and countries, possible war between the two Koreas, a debt crisis in Washington bogged down by partisanship and now Putin is threatening to build more nukes.

Continue Reading

I love this guy.

“This is not a time for compromise, and I can tell you that we will not compromise on our principles,” Boehner said during an appearance on conservative Sean Hannity’s radio show.

Continue Reading