>>Perhaps I have security breach fatigue, but I am somewhat fed up with the usual "emails stolen" headline. An address and a name are by definition publicly available records. You can steal them simply by walking down the street and taking down mailbox names (or requesting these records from the city hall).

I may be able to find out your email address, but that's not the same thing as knowing that you have an account on some specific website. If I know the latter, that opens you to phishing and social engineering attacks. I can send you highly targeted emails from a spoofed address and get you to click a link or open a file attachment and install malware on your system.