There is good and bad to the news that Britain surpassed the United States for the first time ever in donations to the World Bank's unit to combat world poverty.
This should help dispel the notion that the bank's International Development Association is an arm of the U.S. Treasury doing Washington's will around the world. The more depressing side to the news is that the United States - with an economy five times the size of Britain's - is doing far less than it could and should to help the world's poorest countries.
