20 years ago, ABC held a series of live televised town halls re: the HIV/AIDS epidemic and taught us how to put condoms on a banana.

WHY, when there are 54 MILLION Americans enduring hunger, 17.2 million of them children, as many as 53 million in poverty, 3.5 million homeless, (with uncounted MILLIONS from foreclosures, now moved in with family & friends), as many as 5.2 million longest unemployed Tier V 99ers NOT covered in tax "deal", record child & domestic abuse, record suicide rates, library closures, OVERWHELMED food banks, homeless shelters, human services, etc., charity giving by the wealthy down 35% in 2009, (according to Bloomberg), does the news media NOT step up to HELP educate the masses/our elected officials and bring the entities together to have a National discussion? This is CRITICAL stuff to 1/6 of our population that has NO voice. The camera lens is on Washington, D.C., their ineffectiveness and rhetoric rather than on WE The People!
While I applaud MSNBC for it's 'Lean Forward' campaign, for hiring Ted Williams/homeless man with a "Golden voice", and the 'Education Nation' focus, I have to point out that 1 in 4 children is HUNGRY in America's classrooms which leads to slower learning, (holding up the rest of classrooms), disruptive behavior, proven health issues that will grow as they grow, etc. This IS PART of the education "story"! These issues are affecting YOUR children too, if you are one of the lucky that has a job! This is our future. This is a matter of National Security!

There are many COOL solutions but we need news media to shine the light of their lenses on them so that communities can share, learn and implement. This is how we start rebuilding America.

Please URGE NBC/MSNBC/CNBC to host live town halls as soon as possible, before the GOP Congress rolls over on us more in lieu of banksters.

To BREAK the monopolies of broadband, cable companies and spur more competiton in the digital age for both rural and urban areas. Our future needs MORE digital capacity & competition. Long term goal. Whenever streets are opened up with trenches, or work done on utilities, mandating installing multiple CHEAP conduit BUNDLES so when the system is complete, fiber optic cables can be pulled into the system and either leased out for greater competion to new companies in the telecommunications sector or offered by cities as a new utility service. The City of Alburquerque brilliantly and PROACTIVELY lined the inside of all its sewer pipes (to the inside pipe's top via brackets) with fiber optic cables to bring more broadband services to the city. American innovation at its best.