A week after allegations of election fraud sent thousands of Russians into the streets chanting "Russia without Putin," two prominent men have stepped forward to challenge Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in next year's presidential election. Mikhail Prokhorov, a billionaire oligarch best known to Americans as the owner of the New Jersey Nets, and Alexsei Kudrin, a former finance minister who was fired after publicly clashing with President Dmirti Medvedev, have both announced their candidacies. Prokhorov, who said the decision to run was the most serious of his life, said he would offer his political platform in coming weeks.

The Senate is set to vote on a new part of President Obama's $447 billion jobs bill which includes funding for programs to help build roads, bridges and other public works programs. The bill is likely to fail, but that has not stopped the president from continuing to campaign for its passage. Andrea Bernstein, director of the Transportation Nation project and senior correspondent for WNYC, looks at why President Obama continues to push for infrastructure despite it looking like a losing cause.

Ahead of the 2012 presidential election, a fight is brewing on voter identification laws. At stake is the question of whether the problem is serious enough to threaten the results of the elections. South Carolina took an extra step to combat voter fraud in May, when Governor Nikki Haley signed a bill into law which requires voters to show government-issued photo identification. Supporters of the move say that this will curb the potential for voter impersonation. But critics say that this would disenfranchise the thousands of registered South Carolinian voters who do not have a driver’s license or other photo identification, and that voter fraud is not a major problem. Six other states have now adopted similar measures.

Almost all of the four million voters in Southern Sudan casting their votes on whether or not to secede from the North have been affected by decades of bloodshed and civil war in that country. Takeaway producer Noel King has been reporting from the ground in Southern Sudan during the preparation for the vote as well as the referendum itself. Noel shares with us the stories she's heard from people of all different generations, and how all the violence has affected their lives.

Many Congressional Democrats are not happy with President Obama's compromise with Republicans on extending tax cuts. House Democrats showed that by voting not to bring up the tax bill last week. Callie Crossley, host of the Callie Crossley Show on WGBH in Boston, and Charlie Herman, economics editor for The Takeaway and WNYC, look at how the Senate plans to vote today on the bill.

The Senate will vote today on the DISCLOSE Act, a bill already approved by the House, that would require corporations to disclose their spending on federal political campaigns and to reveal their identities in any political ads they fund. The bill is being seen as the Democrats' answer to the Supreme Courts's ruling on the Citizens United case, which allowed big corporations, domestic and foreign, to spend unlimited amounts of money on American elections.

Al Franken and Norm Coleman face off today in Minnesota Supreme Court as oral arguments start for the selection of junior senator in the land of ten thousand lakes. Norm Coleman's team declared that not all the votes have been counted and that Al Franken did not legally obtain the most votes. But, even if the court rules that no more ballots should be counted, Franken may still not gain the victory. Is he good enough, smart enough and dog-gone-it, do enough people like him to elect him Senator?

To figure out what's at stake for Al Franken and Norm Coleman, The Takeaway talks to Tom Scheck from Minnesota Public Radio.

A Minnesota state panel is set today to begin a final recount of contested ballots in the state’s epic Senate race between Republican Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken. At stake in today’s recount are 387 absentee ballots, which probably won’t be enough to swing the election in Coleman's favor, but Coleman says he's not backing down. The Takeaway talks to Minnesota Public Radio reporter and Polinaut blogger Tom Scheck. Again.

The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 yesterday to limit the Voting Rights Act. The ruling says there is no duty to draw voting districts that will elect black candidates in areas where blacks are less than a majority. The Takeaway talks to Nathaniel Persily, Columbia University law professor, and Richard Pildes, New York University law professor, about the implication of the ruling. Specifically, the role of race in elections almost 50 years after the Voting Rights Act was passed, and that the Supreme Court might rule on another section of the Voting Rights Act next month.

The polls have closed in Israel, but the election isn't over. Since no party emerged the clear victor, the outcome is still uncertain. As this all too familiar scenario plays out we wondered what was on the mind of voters in Israel. We ask Donna Metreger, a first-time voter in Israel, for her observations.

Minnesota? Meet Israel. The polls are closed in Israel, but no one knows who won! Both main contenders are claiming victory. Tzipi Livni, who leads the centrist Kadima party has called on her main opponent Binyamin Netanyahu, of the right-wing Likud Party, to join her in a national unity government. For more on these developments, we are joined by the BBC's Robin Lustig in Jerusalem.

Israelis are heading to the polls today in an election that only a few weeks ago seemed a decisive win for former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Now, it's too close to call, but Israel’s Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni of the Kadima party looks like the likely winner. For more on what Livni's win could mean, we turn to Ethan Bronner, Jerusalem bureau chief for our partner the New York Times.

For more of the New York Times coverage of the vote in Israel, read Isabel Kershner's article, Israelis Vote in Volatile Contest for New Leader in today's paper.

Israelis head to the polls today and the race is too close to call. The election is being very closely watched as the outcome will undeniably influence the prospects for peace in the region. To find out what the Israeli voters are saying, we turn to Ros Atkins, a presenter for the BBC World Service's World Have Your Say, who was staked out all day in a shop in Tel Aviv talking to voters.

Here's a video of World Have Your Say encamped in Israel yesterday