SON RISE:

Saif al-Islam el-Qaddafi: Heir to Libya, 36 · Tripoli (Esquire: 75 Most Influential People of the 21st Century, 10/06/08)

The second-oldest son of "Brother Leader" Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi would appear to be out of his mind. Reared by the military dictator who admitted responsibility for the Pan Am flight 103 bombing, Saif al-Islam el-Qaddafi believes democracy can take root in Libya. He once told Al Jazeera, "You have to bring democracy to your countries," referring to the Arab world, adding, "The Arabs should either change or change will be imposed upon them from the outside." With him in power, the Western world, and the U. S. in particular, could get what it theoretically wants in Iraq--the conversion of a large, oil-rich extremist Middle Eastern regime to a peaceful democracy--without the in-between step of a war.

He's making progress. In 2004, when Libya dismantled its weapons of mass destruction programs and the U. S. lifted economic sanctions, el-Qaddafi hired the Monitor Group, a consulting firm in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to help him outline a vision for economic reform that would make Libya--which aims to increase its oil production to three million barrels a day by 2012--a Western-friendly player.