Since 1972, the Freedom House has published the gold-standard report on the state of democracy and civil liberty around the world. The aptly named "Freedom in the World" attempts to measure the level of political and civil freedom in every country and major disputed territory using a simple 7-point scale (1 being most free and 7 least free).

In recent years, the Freedom House has added another report that focuses on the so called "worst of the worst"--countries that score 6.5 or above. This year, 17 countries and three territories fall into this category. These include personality-driven dictatorships (Libya and North Korea), Central Asian crackpots (Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan), disputed territories (South Ossetia and Tibet) and failed states (Somalia and Chad). Thankfully, only one of this year's WOW countries (Saudi Arabia) is a major US ally.

Check out the full report here