Questions tagged [united-states]
Use this tag for questions about claims based in the United States, or limited to the United States.
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Does Apple have more cash reserves than the U.S. government?
There are stories like this floating in the internet.
Apple is now more liquid than the United States government, the Financial Post reports.
As the government struggles to resolve the debt ceiling ...
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Is Congressional net worth up nearly 3700% since 2004?
A link on the Drudge Report today claimed this:
Report
Many have had the sneaking suspicion that our elected “leaders” in
Congress are not going to Washington D.C. to represent us but for
...
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What is the use of the questions on the US Visa Waiver form?
Whenever I enter the US, I need to fill out a little green form. The front page asks all sorts of reasonable questions: Name, passport number, date of birth, address I plan to be in the US etc.
The ...
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Is Congress's pay protected even if the US defaults?
Today around the watercooler, us active duty military, and civil service employees were discussing the possible effects of the US defaulting. Since we are all paid by the government, this is a very ...
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Is the Ralph Williams angry car salesman clip real?
Someone sent me this video of a car salesman supposedly working for Ralph Williams, a dealership owner in the Bay Shore area. There are lots of references online to this video. See the google results ...
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Do states give local governments the power to ban opposing political groups?
This odd claim is presented in a comment thread at the blog Dispatches from the Culture Wars in comment #6 on the linked post. It refers to a city council banning a community group. Seems to me this ...
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Do wind farms have a significant impact on weather patterns in the US?
On my way in to work today there was a guest on the radio claiming that the "Heat Dome" was the result of the disturbance of natural wind patterns by the windfarms that have proliferated the ...
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Are antipsychotic drugs vastly overused in the US?
A recent opinion piece in Al Jazeera titled "Mass psychosis in the US" claims that antipsychotic drugs are overused in the US, mostly due to the influence of "Big Pharma" which is pushing new atypical ...
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Are secret U.S. army tests to blame for TV presenters speaking gibberish?
I've seen this suggestion made in several places; here's one.
Around the time of April 2011, several US news presenters or personalities descended into speaking gibberish on national TV. Some have "...
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Did Ronald Reagan's LPS Act increase homelessness in California?
I have heard and read claims suggesting that California passed a law when Ronald Reagan was governor that lead to a surge of homelessness and that explains to a large extent the relative high rate of ...
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Does pornography bring in more money than all US sport franchises combined?
I've been sent chain emails about pornography industry revenues and was quite flabbergasted by some of the figures. The version I recalled hearing was that pornography brings in more revenue than all ...
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Did Lee Harvey Oswald kill John F. Kennedy?
L.H. Oswald claimed he was innocent and didn't kill J.F. Kennedy. There are various theories on what could have happened that day, but I didn't "study" all the evidence and research, so I don't know ...
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How often do law enforcement authorities commandeer civilian transportation?
You've seen the movies: the cop-action-hero's car blows up and he is forced to bust out his gun and his badge and commandeer a civilian's vehicle for transportation. How often does this actually ...
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Does the AMA limit the number of doctors to increase current doctors' salaries?
A suggested reason why doctors get paid so much more in the US as opposed to other developed countries is that the American Medical Association (AMA) artificially limits the physician supply in order ...
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Is asking about U.S. citizenship an illegal interview question?
From About.com,
Are you a U.S. citizen?
Every interview I have had has asked this. Even pre-interview screening includes this question. Is it really illegal for them to ask this?
Note: Not really ...
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Does the U.S. President have a red phone?
From a 2010 news article:
Obama noted that Medvedev had opened a
Twitter account while visiting the
company's headquarters in California.
"I have one, as well, so we may be
able to finally throw ...
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Does Audrey Tomason's apocalypse equation thesis exist?
Recently it has been claimed that Audrey Tomason, the US government's Director for Counter-Terrorism has written a master's thesis about an "apocalypse equation":
[Audrey Tomason] wrote a master ...
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Could the USA have a secret colony on Mars?
I've read a number of articles suggesting that the USA has a Mars colony, including (if I recall correctly, but I can't find the link now) one where an official in China stated that they believed the ...
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Is inflation in the US higher than government statistics suggest? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
Does the US government voluntarily underreport inflation?
The Consumer Price Index claims to reflect "changes in the prices paid by urban consumers for a representative basket ...
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Are atheists strongly underrepresented in US prison communities?
This popularly referenced survey gives statistics about the number of atheists in US prisons.
It suggests just 0.21% of the prison population is atheist. There are more scientologists! This is ...
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Is there a high chance of being raped in US prisons?
If there is anything one takes away about US prisons from television and movies, it is that there is a really high chance of you getting raped in the shower or in some other dark place.
Now, I don't ...
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Was Osama Bin Laden Dead Since 2002?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpBPVkpmoeg&feature=related
The above video claims that Osama was killed a while back, and that all the tapes released since then are fakes by the US Govt. Is there ...
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Is it possible to fly 4 helicopters anywhere in a country without official knowledge?
According to reports, there were 4 helicopters used in the raid on Osama Bin Laden.
Is it conceivable that even one helicopter could be flown so close to the capital of another country without raising ...
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Did Martin Luther King, Jr. say that "I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy"?
Did Martin Luther King, Jr. say
I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy
It's been going around the tweeterwebs today in ...
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Does US Intelligence have built-in interfaces in major social networking sites that allow them to browse personal information at will?
From this interview from Julian Assange:
He believes the social network is joined by Google, Yahoo and other major US organisations that have “built in interfaces for US Intelligence”:
It’...
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Did the financial sector make up 40% of the US economy before the 2008 financial crisis?
I'm watching a video that claims that 40% of the US economy is made up by the financial sector. It then goes on to talk about the Financial crisis of 2008, so I would assume it's referring to pre-...
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Is alcohol for consumption tested for carbon-14 radioactivity to be considered legal?
I just viewed this interesting video about radioactive ethanol from plants as opposed to non-radioactive ethanol from crude oil. In it, the professor says he's heard it's illegal in the USA to sell ...
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Do small businesses create the majority of the jobs in America?
Do small businesses create the majority of the jobs in the United States?
I guess it would depend on one's definition of small business, but stipulating that the definition is the one used by ...
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Do upper-income people in the US think they aren't upper income?
Andrew Gelman claims on his blog:
Upper-income people still don't realize they're upper-income
If people are directly asked whether they consider themselves to be upper income, do they underrate ...
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Internet Gambling Linked to Terrorist Financing?
Currently there is a debate in the United States over the legal status of Internet Gambling; specifically, playing Poker for "real money" over the Internet.
Many of those who are opposed to Internet ...
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Did Bill Ayers ghost-write for Obama?
According to Conservapedia's article on William Ayers:
In an October 2008 article in American
Thinker, Jack Cashill presented
evidence that Ayers ghostwrote Obama's
first book, "Dreams From ...
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votes
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Did the CIA sell drugs in the US?
According to Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Gary Webb in his controversial article series The Dark Alliance
For the better part of a decade, a San
Francisco Bay Area drug ring sold tons
of ...
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You have the right to one phone call when arrested - A Hollywood myth?
(Image Source)
According to Cracked.com the "one phone call" rule is a Hollywood invention. They base this on the information this attorney gives:
The one phone call is another one of
the urban ...
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Has anyone noteworthy given up their US citizenship to escape taxation?
I've heard it said that a US citizen can escape paying US income taxes by giving up their citizenship and living in a foreign country (presumably, somewhere that has lower taxes or perhaps where a ...
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Is there evidence to support that Area 51 was just a cover-up for a much larger operation?
Area 51 is frequently mystified in popular movies, stories, alien investigations, and sometimes, even the media. If the US really wanted to keep this a secret, why would they allow the media to ...
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Did the U.S. government have prior knowledge of 9/11?
This has been said a lot of times in lots of places. Did the US government know about the attacks prior to the attacks, and were they involved with the attacks?
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Do rich companies pay little/no corporate income taxes in the United States?
It's a fairly common "fact" that if you make enough money, that you can hire lawyers who can hide all of your money, so that you end up paying little to no tax. Is this true?
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Is the Amityville Horror real?
No one disputes the atrocity of the 1974 murders committed by Ronald DeFeo Jr which occurred at the house. However, was there any truth to the 1977 book by Jay Anson which chronicled various claims ...
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Is there a gold stockpile at "Fort Knox"?
I heard an interesting conspiracy theory recently with the basic idea that there isn't a gold stockpile at "Fort Knox" (anymore or ever). With the level of security so great there and reportedly few ...
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Is Barack Obama a natural born US citizen?
In this Politico Article dated 8/5/10 the results of a poll taken on President Obama are discussed:
The poll of 1,018 adults shows 27
percent of Americans believe the
president was “probably” ...
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Why do we not have vehicles that meet or exceed the MPG ratings of vehicles that were available in the 1990s
I'm seeing some conspiracy theories making the rounds which claim that car-manufacturers are intentionally making cars that aren't as fuel efficient as they used to be. They often point to the Geo ...
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Was McCarthy directly involved with the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)?
There are often claims that Joe McCarthy started, led, or was responsible for the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).
Examples:
BBC reports "Many of those forced to appear before ...
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Is a kill switch being considered to shut down the internet?
One of my friends has been particularly upset about this. I will try to track down a serious citation of someone making this claim but have been unable to do so.
I believe there is a commission or ...
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How dangerous is thiomersal (thimerosal)?
Some people blame the preservative thiomersal in vaccines for all kinds of illnesses, but mainly for autism. As thiomersal is a mercury compound, there is some plausibility in suspecting it may cause ...
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