Freedom House's annual report on the state of global freedom labels 90 countries as "free" in 2012, increasing by three from the previous year, with 16 countries showing positive gains.
But 27 countries' scores declined, marking the seventh year the report has indicated more declines than gains worldwide.
North Korea, our sworn enemy, and Saudi Arabia, our staunch ally, are both on the "worst of" list. Tricky stuff, geopolitics.
