Big things, little things

ONE BIG important thing and a ONE little crappy thing that bugs me about we of the primate persuasion.

BIG THING:
The number of people who died today from (mostly easily preventable) infectious and parasitic diseases: 41,000. Most think issues of clean water and poverty are "complex", but that's a copout and largely untrue. Certainly resources now put to questionable uses could do far more good combating global poverty. Contrary to what some think, higher living standards lead to LOWER birth rates and LESS population pressure, thus it's in everybody's interest to address extreme poverty far more proactively.

Liberals are mired in mostly exaggerated concerns about environmental collapse and the luxury rights of those living in capitalist democracies. Meanwhile, conservatives exaggerate the importance of military dominance and only seem to talk about reckless Government spending when it's in the social sectors. Where are the founders when you need them?

LITTLE THING:
Fox News. It's not so much the conservative bias, it's that they rarely cover anything of substance and when they do it's often from a perspective so steeped in patriotic nonsense that the story is effectively lost. An interesting exception was the reporting "on the scene" during Hurricane Katrina. It was conspicuously critical of the government, poignant in it's representations of the poor, and courageous. Even Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity were sounding like journalists!