BTC-E is great in terms of being a fully functional quick exchange that accepts a wide variety of payment sources and also has a real-time chat room which although trolly at times is fairly novel and interesting to watch from a speculative perspective. I know some people are worried that it is based in Russia but I think that it certainly the best option right now. The decline of Mt. Gox seemed inevitable their servers sucked and their costs of transferring money were expensive and their means of transferring funds were too few.
"trolly at times" - there's an understatement to top them all

but it is fun to watch for 15 mins.
Gox is also declining because you just can't get cash out of there easily. Who's ever heard of an exchange that takes months to process outgoing wires. Rearrange the following: "foot shooting the in yourself "
I think btc-e is based in Bulgaria actually but same ball park.