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More than 20 years after he transformed Italian TV, Berlusconi is Prime Minister for the third time; he has already served longer in the office than anyone since 1946. Of late, to be sure, he's taken some lumps. Italy's Constitutional Court overturned a law granting Berlusconi immunity from prosecution while in office, clearing obstructions to trials in which he is accused of bribery and illicit accounting at Mediaset. But even were he to be turfed out tomorrow, Berlusconi would leave a lasting legacy. His TV shows have seen to that. "Berlusconi changed the culture of Italy before...
...America has made since the coups, civil wars and corruption of the past. The institutional rot that spawned those Cold War conflicts remains, not just in Honduras but in nearby countries such as Guatemala, Nicaragua and Panama. In Nicaragua, for example, leftist President Daniel Ortega last month had Supreme Court justices loyal to him summarily lift a constitutional ban on presidential re-election so he can run again in 2011, even though most Nicaraguans oppose the change. In Panama, members of the powerful Arias family have so far been able to block the will of a relative who left some...
...poverty and the richest 10% owns more than 40% of the wealth. But measures like a minimum-wage hike irked the political and business élite who fear Zelaya's ties to firebrand Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. Zelaya overreached in June when he defied a Supreme Court order not to hold a referendum asking if a constitutional-reform assembly should be held. But instead of trying him legally for that crime, Zelaya's foes committed their own - flying him off to exile at gunpoint. (They rationalized the move by insisting Zelaya was plotting to lift Honduras...
Attorney General Eric Holder announced that five alleged plotters of the Sept. 11 attacks, including confessed mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will face trial next year in a New York City federal court. Holder and President Obama say they expect prosecutors to push for the death penalty. Critics slammed the decision, claiming that the defendants' presence in New York will create a media circus and put the city at risk of another attack. Experts also noted the legal issues a civilian trial will raise--including the use of evidence obtained through waterboarding, to which Mohammed was subjected 183 times...
...doesn't escape blame, either. The report says that MONUC worked closely with a Congolese general named Bosco Ntaganda, nicknamed "The Terminator," who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes for enlisting child soldiers. Ntaganda's troops have taken control of several areas and are believed to reap about $250,000 a month in taxes on charcoal, timber and minerals, the report said. "It really does punch a hole in the argument that has been put forward by MONUC, which claimed that these military operations, while difficult and problematic, are bringing results," Anneke Van Woudenberg, a senior...