Not at all pointless.  I learn a lot from these and greatly enjoy them.  I get very little news on France outside of the occasional NYT article and on the very rare occasion that I buy a copy of the WSJ with an equally-rare article on France.  Usually the WSJ has no stories on the country.  (Their reporters stick to the EU, as a whole, or, now and then, Britain and Germany.)  The morons on the editorial board are usually the only ones to bring the subject up, and you know how they are.  (I swear, I read their editorials, and I've got to believe that the board consists of a bunch of academic-wannabe losers who never got laid in college.  Such an angry group.)  But, hey, what can you expect from a paper owned by Dow Jones?

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.