Denmark, Finland and Belgium Have Best Democracies, Experts Say

A new democracy barometer from the University of Zurich and the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB) shows the development of the thirty best democracies in the world. Denmark, Finland and Belgium have the highest quality of democracy, whereas Great Britain, France, Poland, South Africa and Costa Rica the lowest. Moreover, the barometer shows no evidence of a crisis of democracy.

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GOP Presidential Hopefuls Are Alienating the Rest of the World by Fusing Christian Superiority with Blatant Revisionist American History

Generations of American politicians have long proclaimed the United States the greatest nation in the world to win over voters. And it very often works. Now a new breed of Republican leaders -- politicians like former vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, Sen. Jim DeMint, Rep. Mike Pence and Sen. Marco Rubio -- are working overtime to reclaim the well-worn idea of "American exceptionalism" as their own.

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Climatic Fluctuations in Last 2,500 Years Linked to Social Upheavals

It would seem that there are striking chronological parallels between significant variations of climate and major historical epochs, such as the Migration Period and the heyday of the Middle Ages. This is the conclusion reached following a study undertaken by researchers from Switzerland, Germany, Austria, and the USA, in which they were able to reconstruct the summer climate in Europe over the last 2,500 years from the information provided by annual tree rings.

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The National Empathy Divide

Every terrible rift is the occasion for peace and the place for the peacemaker. And often peace is nothing more, at first, than connecting, pulling the injured or ostracized back into the social circle and the beginning the process of healing.

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Mortgage Lenders Committed Massive Fraud and Now Wall St. Wants to Escape from the Lawbreaking

They committed widespread fraud – largely whitewashed by the corporate media – and, in the process, threw the economy into a tailspin. They've broken into and stolen people's homes, and, in the name of “efficiency,” bilked state governments out of billions of dollars in real estate transfer fees. They've even admitted to ripping off – and foreclosing on – soldiers deployed overseas, in violation of the law.

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Financial Crisis Inquiry Panel Blames Greenspan, Wall Street, Says Crisis Was 'Avoidable'

A deeply divided U.S. investigative panel issued a scathing critique of the culture of deregulation championed by Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, saying the government had ample power to avert the financial crisis of 2007-2009 and chose not to use it.

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Koch Brothers Feel the Heat In DC, as Broad Coalition Readies Creative Action to Quarantine the Billionaires Gathering in California Desert

As the right-wing Koch brothers get ready for their billionaires' strategy session in Rancho Mirage, Calif. on Sunday, Jan. 30, big questions are being raised in Washington about the Kochs' relationship with radical conservative justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

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Clarence Thomas should be INDICTED -- UPDATED

Clarence Thomas, for the past 20 years has checked "None" under "Spouse's Non-Investment Income" on his financial disclosure forms. That, we now know, was untrue. The law that is the basis for the disclosure form, includes reference to possible criminal penalties under 18 U.S. Code.

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Robert Fisk: A new truth dawns on the Arab world

Leaked Palestinian files have put a region in revolutionary mood.

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Remembering Howard Zinn, Once Again

In 1977 I took my first job in higher education at Boston University. One reason I went there was because Howard Zinn was teaching there at the time. As a high school teacher, Howard's book, "Vietnam: the Logic of Withdrawal," published in 1968, had a profound effect on me. Not only was it infused with a passion and sense of commitment that I admired as a high school teacher and tried to internalize as part of my own pedagogy, but it captured something about the passion, sense of commitment and respect for solidarity that came out of Howard's working-class background. It offered me a language, history and politics that allowed me to engage critically and articulate my opposition to the war that was raging at the time.

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