It's our duty as citizens of democracies to stay informed. If we don't stay informed then it is only the special interests that stand to make money that influence policies. Also it is important to stay on top of your industry trends to make sure you don't miss some opportunity. I agree that most crime and tragedy stories are useless information.
I disagree. I tend to think that brain has limit to the amount of information that can be perceived thoroughly. After going past this limit you are basically overloading your brain with information, which leads to decreased performance and such.
I'm not sure if there are any studies in this area (although I won't be surprised if there are) so I can only tell that from my personal experience (so this might be very subjective obviously).
