"In other parts of the world..."

Any of you ever read The Cider House Rules? I can't recommend it highly enough; I read it for the first time (and re-read it many times thereafter - something I really don't do with most books) in the mid-1980s, and it still ranks as one of my favorite books of all time. The movie was not so hot, the book is absolutely outstanding - follow the Amazon link I provided and read some of the reader comments, you'll get the gist.

Anyway, in that book one of the characters, a man named Dr. Larch, keeps a journal and his entries always begin with one of two phrases: either "Here in St. Clouds.." or "In other parts of the world...", and I was reminded of that as I started to write this post.

"In other parts of the world" this is a fairly significant news item. Here in the US, not so much.