Harper’s Index

Days since the U.S. government first placed the nation under an “elevated terror alert” that the level has been relaxed : 0¹

Years of “elevated” or “high” terror alerts since then : 2²

Aid that U.S. leaflets dropped on Fallujah in July threatened to freeze if insurgent attacks continued : $102,000,000³

Number of insurgent attacks in Fallujah in the week before and after the leafletting, respectively : 21, 36⁴

Compensation the U.S. government has paid Iraqis for wrongful deaths, injuries, and property damage since 2002 : $4,475,643⁵

Total “death gratuities” the U.S. government has paid since then to survivors of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq : $11,436,000⁶

Total amount Ohio’s crime-victims compensation fund has paid the survivors of one U.S. soldier killed in Iraq : $5,656.77⁷

Maximum percentage income- and corporate-tax rate under laws made for Iraqis by the Coalition Provisional Authority : 15⁸

Days a House committee postponed July hearings on antidepressants while its chair considered a pharmaceutical-lobbyist job : 50⁹

Number of the 5 Republicans investigating Rep. Tom DeLay on ethics charges who have taken donations from his PAC : 4¹⁰

Number of Ohio election boards being sued over erroneously informing parolees that they may not vote : 21¹¹

Number of banks robbed in Davenport, Iowa, while John Kerry and George Bush gave speeches there on August 4 : 3¹²

Estimated number of right-wing Jewish extremists Israel monitors as potential threats to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon : 300¹³

Years after leaving his post during the Vietnam War that a Connecticut man was arrested for desertion in July : 34¹⁴

Minimum number of Guantánamo detainees who boycotted their military tribunals in August : 13¹⁵

Average number of kidnappings per week in Iraq since March : 5¹⁶

Number of non-Iraqis detained there by U.S. forces in the last year : 400¹⁷

Ratio of the minimum number of beheadings by the Saudi government last year to those by Saudi terrorists so far this year : 50:1¹⁸

Date on which Turkmenistan added questions on the president’s spiritual writings to its driver’s-license test : 6/12/04¹⁹

Percentage of Mississippians who have failed their written driver’s-license test since it became computerized last year : 60²⁰

Chance that a new light vehicle bought in the United States last year was a truck or SUV : 1 in 2²¹

Minimum number of U.S. children killed since 1998 as a result of heat stroke after being left locked in cars : 219²²

Rank of last year among those in which the largest number of children died this way : 1²³

Square miles of surface areas between Canada and Mexico that are impervious to water : 112,610²⁴

Square miles of wetlands : 98,460²⁵

Rank of this year’s desert-locust plague in northern Africa among the world’s worst in 15 years : 1²⁶

Number of countries susceptible to such a plague : 65²⁷

Chance that a southern Sudanese woman will die in childbirth : 1 in 9²⁸

Chance that a southern Sudanese girl will complete primary school : 1 in 100²⁹

Projected lifespan in years of a Zimbabwean born in 1989 and one born in 2002, respectively : 60, 34³⁰

Number of its international workers that Doctors Without Borders has lost to political violence in its 34-year history : 8³¹

Number of them killed in Afghanistan in June : 3³²

Number of American states in which one may legally shoot fish with a semi-automatic rifle : 2³³

Record number of skips achieved by a stone skipper : 40³⁴

Seconds by which this year’s winner of the men’s Olympic 400-meter dash was faster than the winner of the women’s : 5.81³⁵

Seconds difference in 1972 : 6.42³⁶

Factor by which the number of U.S. girls under 19 who got breast implants last year exceeded the number who did in 2002 : 3³⁷

Price a haunted-house supplier charges for a male figure “being tortured like never before,” flesh-ripping sounds included : $2,295³⁸

Estimated price a British cable company will charge for a kit to track “evidence of the paranormal” via the Internet : £150³⁹

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