Happy New Year

via Andrew Sullivan, Andrew Sprung gives us some good news. Of course, he also proclaims "my core belief is that the electorate is smarter than all of us." I've heard a lot of politicians say that while holding public office.
Anyhoo, a tantalizing tidbit:

"Whereas real per capita income [worldwide] increased by about one fifth per decade in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, it is expect to increase by about one third in the 2000s...The poverty rate is expected to continue to fall sharply from 57.2 percent in 200 to 49.7 percent in 2010 at a poverty line of one-half of the mean." (Lynge Nielsen, IMF Working Paper, Global Relative Poverty, April 2009

Health: Global life expectancy at birth was 64 in 1990, 66 in 2000, and 68 in 2007. Under-5 mortality rates per 1000 live births were 91 in 1990, 78 in 2000, and 67 in 2007.From 1990 - 2006, the number of people in developing regions using improved sanitation facilities has increased by 1.1 billion; the proportion of the global population with access to improved drinking water sources rose from 76% to 86% in the same period. (World Health Statistics 2009.)