Willful ignorance is lethal.

Percentage of Americans Who ...

(Civics)

can't name their state's U.S. senators: 70 [a]
can't name their district's U.S. representative: 71 [a]
can't name the U.S. Supreme Court's chief justice: 89 [b]
couldn't name any current U.S. Supreme Court justice: 65 [c]
don't know who Harry Reid is: 85 [d]
don't know who Robert Gates is: 79 [d]
don't know the year in which America invaded Iraq: 62 [e]
favored (as of late 2007) the U.S. launching an unprovoked attack on Iran: 52 [x]
failed to name freedom of the press among First Amendment rights: 86 [f]
don't recognize "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" as being unalienable rights named in the Declaration of Independence: 71 [h]
thought the U.S. Constitution says (or weren't sure whether it says)
"From each according to his ability, to each according to his need": 69 [j]
judged Ronald Reagan to be a greater American than any of the following: Washington, Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Ben Franklin, FDR, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, Eleanor Roosevelt, Frederick Douglass, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Alexander Hamilton, Theodore Roosevelt, Susan B. Anthony, Harriet Tubman, or Mark Twain: 24 [k]
Believed (as of June 2007) "that Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq was directly involved in planning, financing, or carrying out the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001": 41 [b]
Believed (as of early 2006) that America's war on Iraq was "to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9-11 attacks" (respondents were U.S. troops serving in Iraq): 85 [l]

(Science and Technology)

agreed that God "probably" or "definitely" created human beings "pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years": 66 [m]
don't know that plastics are made from petroleum: 70 [n]
can't identify DNA as a key to heredity: over 67 [o]
think the Sun revolves around the Earth: about 20 [o]
say it's certain or probable that using a cordless phone in a bathtub poses an electrocution risk: 49 [p]
say it's certain or probable that antibiotics kill both bacteria and viruses: 48 [p]

(Geography)

can't find Iraq on a map: 63 [r]
can't find the United Kingdom on a map: 65 [r]
can't find Ohio on a map: 57 [r]

(Functional Literacy)

have read zero books -- of any kind -- in the previous year: 43 [s]
are unlikely to identify a main idea of an ordinary magazine article: 84 [t]
are unlikely to find and identify one given item on a simple chart: 64 [t]
are unlikely to solve a consumer arithmetic problem requiring the multiplication of "140.0 gallons of oil" by "five cents ($.05) per gallon": 48 [t]

(Intellectual Honesty)

admit to at least one instance of academic cheating (MBA candidates): 56 [u]
engage in "serious" academic cheating (high school students): 75 [v]

Television Viewing Habits

Americans watch an average of about 4:41 of TV per person per day [w]

a Louis Menand at The New Yorker (2004); see also What Americans Know About Politics and Why it Matters by Michael Delli Carpini and Scott Keeter (1996)

b Newsweek (2007)

c FindLaw's US Supreme Court Awareness Survey (2003)

d Pew (2007)

e Pew (2007)

f University of Connecticut (2005)

h Opinion Research Corporation for Colonial Williamsburg (1998)

j Columbia Law Survey (2002)

k The History Channel's & AOL's "Greatest American" survey (2005); explained on Wikipedia

l Le Moyne College-Zogby (2006)

m Gallup (2007)

n InsightExpress (2007)

o Jon D. Miller, reported in the New York Times (2005)

p ITEA/Gallup Poll (2004)

r National Geographic (2006)

s Reading at Risk: A Survey of Literary Reading in America (2004) NEA

t 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy (2003); see also NAAL's 1993 report and the National Survey of America's College Students (2006)

u Donald L. McCabe, et. al.; reported in the Washington Post (2006)

v Rutgers' Management Educations Center; reported by CNN (2002)

w Nielsen Media Research (2006) and Eurodata TV Worldwide (as reported in Melbourne's April 12, 2005 The Age); There's a slight difference in their numbers (4:35 vs. 4:46, respectively); the average is 4:41.

x Zogby (2007)