Looking for a way to kill the rest of your day?

There’s this piece running at Salon about—well, mostly about—the state of education in the U.S. by an author named David Masciotra that has, overall, the sweaty tone of a desperate attempt to fill a column by deadline, which is why I’m a little reluctant to accept these stats at face value, as delicious as that might be…

 

"Two-thirds of Americans cannot name a single Supreme Court justice, and half are incapable of identifying all three branches of government. Forty-two percent of the public does not believe in evolutionary biology, while 24 percent believe that the sun orbits the earth.

"Nearly a quarter of Americans read below the fifth-grade level, which helps to explain why only 29 percent read a newspaper…"

And some other stuff too, But we’re already over the top.

Does the quarter of Americans who read below fifth-grade level include those who are actually below the fifth grade? Are newspapers only newspapers if they’re printed on paper? And, by the way, do you have to read at fifth-grade level to read one?

Does the two-thirds who can’t name a Supreme Court justice include senators?

You could look all this stuff up and try to figure it out—fact checker for a day.

Nobody said work avoidance would be easy.