11/90Percentage of GOP state chairmen who say they would prefer someone other than Dan Quayle’ on the ticket in 1992: 27
4/90Amount the Pentagon “saved” by moving the first payday of fiscal 1990 back to fiscal 1989: $3,000,000,000
1/91Hours after the 1991 tax increase was passed that President Bush promised to “hold the line on taxes” from now on: 13
11/91Number of times the phrase “happens to be black” has appeared in the New York Times since January 1990: 17
12/91Projected average annual growth rate for the U.S. economy during the 1990s, according to Merrill Lynch: +2.2
2/91Ratio of the number of corporate bonds that Moody’s downgraded in 1990 to the number it upgraded: 4:1
2/91Rank of Richard Gephardt, among Iowans’ first choices for the 1992 Democratic presidential nomination: 1
3/91Percentage increase, since 1990, in the membership of the South African Communist Party: 1,250
4/91Percentage increase, during 1990, in the number of times the word “recession” appeared in the New York Times: 200
4/91Number of beagles used in radiation research that the Department of Energy will bury in a toxic-waste dump in 1991: 850
4/91Stud fees the Justice Department plans to earn in 1991 from a show horse seized from an alleged drug dealer: $2,500,000
5/91Rank of 1991, among years in which the U.S. State Department has warned Americans to avoid the most countries: 1
7/91Number of gambling casinos an Austrian company has opened in Czechoslovakia since January 1990: 13
8/91Total PAC funds that went to the 331 candidates challenging incumbents for House seats in 1990: $6,898,631
Total PAC funds that went to the 79 incumbents who ran for re-election unopposed: $13,277,348
8/91Amount of the toxic-waste fine that the EPA levied against Disneyland in 1990: $550,000
8/91Number of cigarette butts collected on U.S. beaches during the 1990 National Beach Cleanup: 531,828
9/91Chances that a Democrat cannot name anyone “mentioned lately” as a 1992 Democratic presidential candidate: 3 in 4
1/92Percentage increase in U.S. health-care costs since January 1990: 16
1/92Percentage of Californians who voted in 1990 to limit the term of state legislators: 52
12/92Weekly church services a Kentucky man must attend until 1997 as part of his sentence for growing marijuana: 3
12/92Percentage change, since 1990, in the number of women between the ages of 40 and 44 using birth control pills: +100
2/92Percentage increase, during 1991, in the number of New Hampshire residents receiving food stamps: 47
4/92Ratio of federal spending on prison construction to federal spending on public-housing construction since 1990: 4:3
4/92Amount President Bush proposes to spend on construction of new public housing in 1993: 0
Percentage of all spending the President proposes for the next five years that will come from Pentagon budget cuts: 0.6
5/92Estimated number of American homeowners who had foreclosure proceedings initiated against them in 1991: 488,800
5/92Percentage change, between 1990 and 1991, in the number of crimes committed against Arab-Americans: +205
6/92Average monthly contributions to the Women’s Campaign Fund since Anita Hill’s testimony last October: $78,471
6/92Percentage change, since 1990, in U.S. tobacco sales to the countries of the former Soviet Union: +73
6/92Percentage change, since 1990, in the mortality rate for Iraqi children under the age of five: +180
6/92Number of animals that Africanized killer bees have killed since crossing the U.S. border in 1990: 12
8/92Percentage change, since 1990, in the number of documented cases of journalists murdered, worldwide: +91
9/92Copies of a Serbo-Croatian translation of Tocqueville’s Democracy in America that have been sold since 1990: 1,000
9/92Copies of Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People printed in Russia since 1990: 2,667,822
1/93Retirement benefits that will be paid to George Bush in 1993, expressed as a percentage of his previous salary: 169
1/93Average number of crimes against foreigners each day in Germany during the first six months of 1992: 8
10/93Change in funding for the Star Wars defense system in the 1994 budget: -$669,795,000
Change in funding for ground-based-missile defense systems in the 1994 budget: +$704,976,000
11/93Ratio of the U.N.’s 1993 peacekeeping budget in Somalia to its 1993 peacekeeping budget in the former Yugoslavia: 3:2
11/93Amount the Louisiana Campaign Finance Office has earned on sales of David Duke’s 1991 campaign-contributors list: $50,000
2/93Portion of the $150 million appropriated by Congress in 1991 for defense-worker retraining that has been spent: 1/3
3/93Percentage change, since 1990, in the number of illegal African immigrants arrested by Spanish border police: +494
4/93Percentage change, since 1991, in the number of New York Times stories mentioning Elvis: +50
4/93Percentage change, since 1991, in sales of rubber chickens at House of Magic in San Francisco: +150
5/93Number of minutes of network evening news devoted to Hillary Rodham Clinton in the first ten weeks of 1993: 57
6/93Amount by which the 1994 Pentagon budget exceeds the 1975 Pentagon budget, in constant dollars: $32,100,000,000
6/93Estimated portion of the 1994 Pentagon budget that is devoted to defending against the former Soviet Union: 1/2
6/93Percentage change, since 1991, in the number of Americans who lost uninsured savings deposited at failed banks: +1,500
7/93Ratio of the number of drug offenders sent to state prisons in 1990 to the number sent in 1980: 12:1
7/93Ratio of Japanese schools playing the national anthem on the first day of classes in 1992 to those that did in 1985: 2:1
8/93Percentage change, since 1990, in contributions to congressional campaigns made by health-care industry PACs: +36
Average amount spent on weapons by Croatian and Muslim forces each day since then: $2,000,000
9/93Percentage change, since 1991, in the number of on-the-job sexual-harassment complaints filed with the E.E.O.C.: +51
9/93Number of East Germans who have joined Weight Watchers since 1990: 70,000
1/94Chances that a Korean-owned business damaged during the L.A. riots in 1992 has not re-opened: 1 in 2
1/94Ratio of copies of The Age of Innocence sold in 1993 to the total number sold during the 1980s: 6:1
10/94Chances that an arms sale made to a developing country last year was made by the United States: 3 in 4
10/94Ratio of contributions made to the Democratic Party since 1990 by Judith Krantz to those made by Jane Fonda: 3:1
11/94Ratio of spending on campaign ads by Bill Clinton in 1992 to total spending on all health-care-policy ads this year: 2:3
11/94Leftover campaign funds spent on legal fees by 11 former members of Congress between 1979 and 1993: $1,409,445
11/94Percentage change during 1993 in the inflation rate in Serbia: +363,000,000,000,000,000
11/94Tons of talonas, Lithuania’s temporary currency since 1992, that have been converted into toilet paper this year: 30
12/94Weeks in jail served by a Polish journalist in 1992 for calling Solidarity leaders “politicos,” “careerists,” and “dopes”: 10
2/94Percentage change, since 1992, in U.N. members abstaining from a vote to condemn Iraq for its human-rights record: +58
2/94Percentage change, since 1990, in the frequency with which the word “penis” has appeared in the New York Times: +100
2/94Number of animals a Moscow circus left on a Japanese dock in 1992 to make room on its ship for newly bought cars: 93
2/94Ratio of 1993 sales of Hillary: Her True Story to sales of The Life and Career of Bill Clinton: 3:2
3/94Legal fees paid by the DOE since 1990 to defend its contractors in suits over radiation exposure: $47,000,000
3/94Percentage change, since 1991, in sales at Thailand’s 270 7-Elevens: +700
3/94Percentage change, between 1992 and 1993, in the average birth weight of a baby born in Sarajevo: -19
4/94Percentage change, since 1992, in New York Times articles mentioning the “information superhighway”: +2,025
4/94Estimated portion of Shaquille O’Neal’s 1993 income he earned by playing basketball: 1/5
5/94Number of Dan Rostenkowski’s 1993 campaign contributions of more than $200 that came from Illinois residents: 0
5/94Average cost of a House campaign in 1992: $389,588
6/94Percentage of all songs played on French radio after 1995 that must be in French, according to a new law passed this year: 40
6/94Amount spent by the town of Hidalgo, Texas, in 1992 to erect a l0-foot statue of a killer bee: $17,850
6/94Amount Random House lost on the 29 of its books included on the 1993 New York Times Notable Books list: $698,000
7/94Number of U.S. veterans of the Persian Gulf War who have filed for environmental-hazard disability since 1991: 3,593
Number of these who have been granted benefits: 282
7/94Percentage change, between 1992 and 1993, in the amount of time network news programs devoted to crime coverage: +100
9/94Percentage change, since 1992, in civil-rights violations by US. colleges, according to the Department of Education: +82
9/94Ratio of the average libel award won in a U.S. court since 1990 to the average amount paid after appeal: 20:1
1/95Percentage change between 1992 and 1993 in the infant-mortality rate in New York City’s Harlem: +60
1/95Number of rubber ducks accidentally spilled in the North Pacific in 1992 by a U.S.-bound freighter: 7,250
11/95Ratio of campaign funds raised by presidential candidates as of June 1995 to the amount raised as of June 1991: 77:1
11/95Campaign funds raised as of June 1995 by the major Republican presidential candidates: $50,049,048
Estimated number of primaries that had occurred in 1992 by the time major Democratic candidates had raised this much: 41
11/95Change since September 1994 in the percentage of Americans who say they have no opinion of Bill Clinton: +6
11/95Percentage of Americans with a household income between $5,000 and $10,000 who voted last year: 23
11/95Federal funds budgeted through 1999 to assist US. phone companies in making their lines easier to tap: $500,000,000
11/95Federal funds spent on maintaining nuclear testing operations since U.S. testing was halted in 1992: $1,185,600,000
11/95Estimated percentage change since 1991 in the number of Brazilian workers engaged in forced labor: +400
11/95Percentage change since 1992 in the number of Americans who play touch football “frequently”: +19
12/95Chances that an applicant to a U.S. police force in 1992 was found to be “overly aggressive” on psychological tests: 1 in 2
12/95Percentage change since 1990 in hours of counseling required by L.A. police employees and their families: +96
2/95Ratio of American households whose income taxes have been cut since 1992 to those whose have been raised: 10:1
2/95Amount Lyndon LaRouche has collected in contributions for his 1996 presidential campaign: $2,180,730
4/95Ratio of Palestinians to Israelis killed in political violence since the signing of the self-rule accord in 1993: 2:1
4/95Number of times Governor Pete Wilson has declared a state of emergency in California since 1991: 30
6/95Points by which Bill Clinton’s approval rating in March 1995 exceeded Ronald Reagan’s in March 1983: 5
Points by which it fell short of George Bush’s approval rating in March 1991: 41
6/95Ratio of soft-money contributions made to the Republican National Committee last January to those made in January 1993: 24:1
6/95Chances that a Russian medical-school graduate in 1990 could not read an electrocardiogram: 1 in 2
7/95Number of years Jeanne Louise Calment, France’s oldest woman, smoked cigarettes before she quit in 1993: 98
8/95Percentage of contributions to the Republican National Committee since 1993 that were of $1,000 or more: 7
Percentage of contributions to the Democratic National Committee that were: 27
8/95Percentage change since 1994 in the price of one minute of prime-time TV advertising in Russia: +200
1/96Change since 1994 in the number of antidepressant prescriptions filled each day for managed-care patients: +34,542
1/96Percentage change since 1993 in the Pentagon’s recruitment advertising budget: +72
10/96Percentage change since 1994 in the number of threats of violence received by members of Congress: +84
10/96Percentage change since 1992 in the number of black delegates at the Republican National Convention: -51
10/96Percentage change since 1992 in presidential campaign contributions made by the gambling industry: +800
11/96Chance that the winning candidate in a 1994 congressional race spent less than his opponent: 1 in 10
12/96Number of its employees the Library of Congress has forced to take psychological exams since 1990: 27
2/96Ratio of visits to Bosnia made by President Clinton since 1992 to those made by the editor of Soldier of Fortune: 1:4
Number today: 26
3/96Percentage of congressional campaign contributions made last year by the top ten corporate PACs that went to Republicans: 70
Percentage that went to Republicans in 1994: 41
3/96Number of PACs that contributed the legal limit last year to Newt Gingrich’s 1996 Georgia primary campaign: 19
3/96Percentage by which Gingrich’s publisher asked retailers last fall to discount his 1995 book, To Renew America: 38
3/96Average age at which an actress won an Academy Award for a leading role during the 1980s: 40
3/96Number of the 24 Mexicans who were billionaires in 1994 who still are: 10
Change in the number of measures passed: -198
5/96Change since 1994 in the price of one square foot of Hong Kong office space: -$546
5/96Chances that a witness deposed by the Senate’s Whitewater committee took the Fifth: 0
Chances that a witness deposed by a 1991 Senate ethics panel investigating Alfonse D’Amato did: 1 in 2
6/96Change since 1994 in the number of Americans contributing at least $15 to the Christian Coalition: -43,407
7/96Chances that an American with a 1994 B.A. in journalism works in public relations, advertising, or is unemployed: 1 in 3
7/96Rank of cigarette butts among the most common debris found on U.S. shores during 1995’s International Coastal Cleanup: 1
8/96Months after a child molester was paroled from prison in 1994 that a VA hospital gave him a penile implant: 10
1/97Amount by which Medicare’s outlays exceeded contributions in 1995, the first year the program had a deficit: $36,000,000
Size of the Medicare deficit in 1996: $4,200,000,000
1/97Number of hospital fires in 1995 caused by the spontaneous combustion of latex patient-examination gloves: 4
1/97Percentage change between 1980 and 1992 in the number of HIV-negative Americans who died of infectious diseases: +22
1/97Percentage change since 1992 in the number of Latinos registered to vote in California: +45
10/97Portion of McDonald’s 1995 revenue that came from overseas: 1/2
10/97Percentage change since 1994 in Prozac prescriptions or recommendations for children under the age of 12: +212
11/97Amount NASA has paid Russia since 1994 to let U.S. astronauts train aboard Mir: $470,000,000
11/97Amount by which Brazilian soccer star Ronaldo’s 1998 team contract exceeds that of Michael Jordan: $9,000,000
12/97Percentage change since 1995 in total soft money raised nationally in the first six months of the election cycle: +29
3/97Percentage change since 1990 in the number of Americans filing for personal bankruptcy: +22
Percentage change since then in the number of students taking LSATs adjusted for Attention Deficit Disorder: +1,510
4/97Value of surplus weapons and equipment one U.S. Air Force base lost track of between 1991 and 1994: $39,000,000
5/97Percentage change in Wyoming auto fatalities since the state raised the highway speed limit to 75 mph in 1995: -16
5/97Ratio of the number of New Yorkers bitten by rats in 1995 to the number bitten by other New Yorkers: 1:3
6/97Number of legal-research junkets to foreign countries made by members of Timothy McVeigh’s defense team since 1995: 9
Number of lawyers, investigators, and technical experts involved in McVeigh’s court-appointed defense: 44
6/97Percentage change since 1995 in federal spending on court-appointed attorneys for death-penalty cases: +68
7/97Percentage change since 1995 in the number of Chinese Embassy staffers assigned to U.S. congressional relations: +100
8/97Estimated percentage change since 1996 in the number of Air Force pilots who have voluntarily left the service: +40
8/97Change in the number of Americans able to receive C-Span since Congress altered cable laws in 1992: -3,500,000
9/97Percentage change since 1990 in the number of U.S. college students studying to be morticians: +45
1/98Estimated value of oil exports Iraq says it has lost per day since 1990 as a result of U.N. sanctions: $3,000,000,000
1/98Number of questions asked of Inspector General Valerie Lau during her 1994 Senate confirmation hearing: 0
11/98Ratio of the number of “cigar” references in Kenneth Starr’s report to the number of “Whitewater” references: 9:1
Fine that the report’s Internet posting might have brought if 1996’s Communications Decency Act had become law: $250,000
11/98Total amount that individuals have spent since 1994 on legal fees related to Starr’s investigation: $23,000,000
11/98Chances that a 1996 campaign contribution of over $200 came from a white man earning at least $100,000 a year: 2 in 3
Chances that a white male donor, making over $100,000 a year, and who gave over $200 to a 1996 campaign “personally knows” a member of Congress: 3 in 4
11/98Estimated number of American women arrested for child abuse since 1977 after using drugs or alcohol while pregnant: 200
12/98Number of countries whose “unsustainable” debt the World Bank identified as “in need” of relief in 1996: 40
12/98Number of Harvard fellowships endowed by members of Osama bin Laden’s family since 1992: 2
12/98Number of individual charges contained in the 8 ethics complaints brought against Newt Gingrich since 1994: 84
2/98Amount by which the number of asylum seekers rejected by France since 1995 exceeds the number that applied: 4,718
2/98Percentage change since 1992 in the number of asylum applications made to European countries: -64
3/98Percentage change in the size of Russia’s economy since the country began following the I.M.F.’s advice in 1992: -25
3/98Number of lawsuits brought against the Cult Awareness Network by members of the Church of Scientology: 53
Number of months since the network went bankrupt in 1996 that Scientologists have owned and operated it: 15
3/98Percentage change since 1996 in the acres of U.S. cropland planted with genetically engineered crops: +300
3/98Factor by which California foreclosures last year exceeded those in 1990: 5
Percentage of these that predate the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994: 52