Following the Axis surrender, Korea's fate, like that of Central Europe, was still to be worked out.  Officially, the victorious Allies were committed to a free, united and independent Korea.  Then in the war's last week, Stalin's Red Army penetrated far into the country's northern half.  American diplomats, their inboxes overflowing, shifted their focus from what should be done to what could be achieved most easily.  In Washington, late one night, they met with their Soviet counterparts and, tracing lines on a map from National Geographic magazine, consented to the peninsula's "temporary" division along the 38th parallel.  The people who lived there were not consulted.

In 1948, with the Cold War well under way, the U.S.-supported Republic of Korea (ROK) and the USSR-backed Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) officially declared their existence--the former in Seoul, the latter in Pyongyang.  North Korea's head of government, hand-selected by the Soviets, was Kim Il-sung, a thirty-three-year-old military officer who had spent the bulk of his life in exile and possessed little formal education.  He did, however, have big ideas.  Determined to reunify the Korean Peninsula on his terms, Kim persuaded the Soviets to underwrite an invasion of the South, boasting to Stalin that he would win easily.   He almost did prevail, but the United States surprised the DPRK by intervening, under a UN umbrella, prompting China to counter by also entering the fray.  In 1953, an amistice was signed to end the fighting, but with no victor, no formal peace, no significant change in borders, and a death toll that included more than a million and a half Koreans, 900,000 Chinese, and 54,000 Americans.

The war was a colossal waste of lives and treasure, so it matters that the DPRK has been built on a lie about who started it.  The worldview of any North Korean begins with the conviction that, in 1950, their country was attacked by sadistic murderers from America and the ROK.  If not for Kim Il-sung's brave leadership and the pluck of DPRK fighters, their homeland would have been laid waste and their ancestors enslaved.  Worse still, the story continues, Americans are evil and do not learn from their mistakes.  Given a chance, the savages will return and wreak more havoc.  Out of this sham narrative come the fear, the anger, and the yearning for revenge that Kim Il-sung harnessed to justify that world's most totalitarian regime.

--Madeleine Albright in Fascism: A Warning, pages 189-191, published in 2018.

I think so. I'm not alone.
Good read here: http://www.salon.com/2015/01/13/have_americans_gone_crazy_partner/

...as a nonmember observer state...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/palestinians-certain-to-win-un-recognition-as-a-state-but-opposition-could-delay-independence/2012/11/29/25030e2a-39e6-11e2-9258-ac7c78d5c680_story.html?hpid=z1

Ahmadinejad actually carried out a “personnel revolution” to change the composition of his Cabinet of Ministers. In that sense, we can agree with the interpretation of Middle East Institute President Evgeny Satanovsky, who said that Ahmadinejad had “made preparations for an internal coup by changing the format of power,” which shows that the clergy has lost influence in the country. Many experts believe that the top brass of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps and the leadership of the Basij militia, which is headed by Ahmadinejad, could now take power in Iran. Incidentally, that may create an extremely favorable context for the negotiations on the Iranian nuclear problem at the talks scheduled for late January in Istanbul. If they actually succeed in achieving the breakthrough everyone expects in Iran’s relations with the rest of the world, Salehi will have a real chance of gaining a firm foothold on his new position.

This article was originally in Russian and I found it here on his LJ journal_neo. While the translations are sometimes a little difficult for me to follow, he usually gives a completely different perspective than what you find in the US or British media.

According to the World Economic Forum, that is. The US held second until last month, now Sweden and Singapore have passed the US. Switzerland just passed the US to take the #1 spot last year. China's moving up and has reached #27. Germany's also climbing the scale, now in the #5 spot. Japan's #6. Finland is #7 and Denmark is #9 putting Scandinavia as a whole in the top 10. Netherlands is #8 and Canada is #10. At the moment. Things are definitely shifting.

The rating is based on 12 variables: institutions, infrastructure, macroeconomic environment, health and primary education, higher education and training, goods market efficiency, labour market efficiency, financial market development, technological readiness, market size, business sophistication, and innovation.

SOURCE
http://www.weforum.org/en/media/Latest%20News%20Releases/NR_GCR10

No nation keeps its word. A nation is a big, blind worm, following what? Fate perhaps. A nation has no honour, it has no word to keep.
--Carl Gustav Jung during an interview with H. R. Knickerbocker in 1939

There's a cynic in me that rears higher when I hear a report about "SOS" signs showing up along the roads in Haiti. The closer to the airport the signs are, the more likely they are to be scams. With loaded humanitarians pouring in, everybody will be trying to get in on the do-gooding action. And it is so much easier to do-good if you have someone local who knows the ropes. Why do your homework when someone there says they will take the money and do good with it in your name? Where money goes, greed awaits. The opportunists will make good on this crisis. I hope that people who are NOT putting up desperation shingles on the road from the airport aren't forgotten.