Perhaps one of the most popular public radio stories of the last few years is “The Giant Pool of Money,” a program that actually explained the mortgage banking crisis and put it in context.
Context. We need it. Here’s Matt Thompson (at left), one of my favorite thinkers in journalism today.
If you’re like most people, you have a certain amount of ambient knowledge that health-care reform is happening. You pay attention to headlines, and you see a lot of stories about Nancy Pelosi saying this, or Mitch McConnell saying that. You catch a line or two about it in a Presidential address. You’ve watched some headlines about it in the evening news.
Last month, Mexico asked the United Nations to designate Mexican food a “cultural patrimony” that must be protected. Mexican cuisine dates back thousands of years to the Mayas and their diet based on diverse varieties of corn, beans and vegetables. Traditional Mexican cuisine should never be confused with what passes for “Mexican food’ in many U.S. restaurants and fast food joints. This photo shows 2 young women in Oaxaca enjoying a traditional chocolate drink called chocolate atole. Photo: Ginny Grossman
From Pune, India, here is Lynette Lamb, a Minneapolis editor and writer (she’s the blond at the far right in the photo). Many of us wonder what we can do to help alleviate some of the suffering and tragedy in the world. The importance of this began revealing itself to Lamb when she and her husband adopted two daughters from China. Here’s Lynette to explain what she was doing with those adorable girls in India:
Forty six journalists have been murdered in Mexico since 2000 and eight more have disappeared, according to 
Two Next Generation journalists Paulina Yanez Navarro and Nancy Huynh , will be in Mexico with Mary Stucky this month reporting for The World, the World Vision Report and other outlets, part of Round Earth’s project to mentor and help train the next generation of global journalists. 
How horrifying to live in a country where one must believe these telephone calls and do what the caller demands. The situation is different in Nicaragua where we interviewed former gang members in Managua (photo left). About El Salvador, three essential questions arise.