The traditional Via Meadia Yule Blog continues today, Boxing Day, with the second of the Thirteen Posts of Christmas. From Christmas Eve through to Twelfth Night, we explore the Christmas story and the ideas behind the celebration.

Merry Christmas and happy holiday to all!

Proselytization is a practice as old (and sometimes as divisive) as religion itself. Most recently, it has reared its head in India.

The story of Hanukah—the “Sunday School” version, and what really happened.

It’s Christmas Eve today and time for the oldest tradition at Via Meadia: our annual Yule Blog when we update and present our thirteen posts of Christmas running from the preparatory Advent blog on Christmas Eve through Twelfth Night. During this holiday season in 2014-2015 we will blog on a light holiday schedule through New Year’s Day and on January 2 we will be back at full force.

By most measures of national security, the world is getting safer. So why do we feel so insecure?

In Uganda, the military ran this year’s beauty pageant. What this tells us about Western aid money and Uganda’s problems with democracy.

The Transatlantic community paved the way for Russian aggression well before the Ukraine crisis, says Estonia’s President, Toomas Ilves.

Never have liberal ideas been so firmly entrenched within America’s core elite institutions. Never have those institutions been so weak and uninfluential.

Nothing short of a miracle will prevent a sharp economic decline in Russia in the coming year, but don’t expect Putin’s popularity to take a big hit because of it.