Pew Research Center Staff

More than 500 years after Columbus first arrived in the New World, nearly half of Americans (48%) think that the United States has had special protection from God for most of its history, according to a 2002 survey.

That’s the number of stories on Google News during the first 18 days of September that contained the word “Taliban.” That’s more than a 1000% increase over the number of stories containing that term in the first 18 days of August.

That’s the percentage of Japanese who think that China’s growing military power is a bad thing for their country. That concern is shared by large majorities of others among China’s neighbors.

That’s the percentage of Pakistanis who say that relations between the U.S. and Pakistan have improved in recent years.

That’s the percentage of online adult Americans who have some type of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service in their home as of December 2005.

That’s the number of unauthorized workers currently in the U.S. labor market who arrived after 2000. The Pew Hispanic Center estimates that these workers constitute about 35% of the total 7.2 million unauthorized workers now in the United States.

That’s the percentage of Americans who oppose allowing pharmacists to refuse to sell birth control pills for religious reasons. Fewer than one-in-five (17%) express support for this type of “conscience clause” exemption.

That’s the percentage of the American public who favor direct negotiations with Iran over the issue of its nuclear program

That’s the number of Americans who remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they first heard the news of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon 5 years ago today.

That’s the percentage of Americans who now think that increasing the U.S. military presence overseas is the best way to reduce the threat of terrorist attacks on the U.S. — a sharp decline from the 48% plurality who thought so on the first anniversary of 9/11.