Attention news media: if you're going to cite numbers, give them some context. Example:
Americans drove 12.2 billion fewer miles in June 2008 than they did in June of last year. That was the biggest monthly drop in a downward driving trend that began in November as soaring gas prices started to pinch consumers. Overall, Americans drove 53.2 billion fewer miles November through June than they did over the same eight-month period a year earlier. -MSNBC
I think that's just great. Americans drive too much. We should drive less. But I have NO FUCKING CLUE how many miles we usually drive. 20 billion? 100 billion? A trillion? Gimme some context or this information is completely useless. The sad thing is, that's what they're going for.
I see this sort of thing all the time - when hearing about the number of barrels of oil in ANWR, the number of pounds of CO2 saved by CFL light bulbs, or any number of common issues. In fact, I see it so often that I start to wonder whether I'm being deliberately underinformed. The news media post articles about problems of the day, without disseminating any real information about them, because numbers without context are not informative. We can feel like the problem is as good as solved, look, 12 billion miles less driving! That's a lot!! Pat ourselves on the back, and go about our day. Come on, we can do a little better than that.
See also: gallons of oil buried in ANWAR, pounds of CO2 released to atmosphere by my TV, federal government subsidies to AMTRAK, deer and moose killed by speeding cars in Yellowstone National Park, et al.
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