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    Public Hearing Better News about Housing and Financial Markets

    Overview As Barack Obama begins his second term in office, the public is hearing a mix of good and bad news about the economy, as it has for much of the past four years. Views of news about real estate values and financial markets have improved and are as positive as they have been in […]

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    Will Conservative Talkers Take On Immigration Reform?

    Back in 2007, when President George W. Bush pushed for new immigration legislation, PEJ research showed the degree to which conservative talk hosts attacked the measure. And, they themselves took credit for helping to kill it. Will these hosts reprise their staunch opposition this time around? The early indications suggest that perhaps not.

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    The Contraception Mandate and Religious Liberty

    On Feb. 1, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released new rules for how the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandate applies to religious nonprofits, including houses of worship, schools and hospitals. Church-state law scholars Ira C. Lupu and Robert Tuttle explain the new rules and the legal arguments that religious groups might make.

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    2011, Foreign-Born Population in the United States Statistical Portrait

    *Visit the most recent data. This statistical profile of the foreign-born population is based on Hispanic Trends Project tabulations of the Census Bureau’s 2011 American Community Survey (ACS). Users should exercise caution when comparing the 2011 estimates with estimates for previous years. Population estimates in the 2011 ACS are based on the latest information from […]

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    Broad Support for Combat Roles for Women

    Overview The public broadly supports the military’s decision to lift restrictions on women in combat. Two-thirds (66%) support allowing women in the military to serve in ground units that engage in close combat, while just 26% are opposed. Opinion on this question is little changed from a Washington Post/ABC News survey two years ago. The […]

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    Viewpoint: Pakistan’s Economic Woes Are Being Overlooked

    Pakistan is a country beset with political difficulties, but they could be of secondary importance to its economic woes. The truth is that the Pakistani people are deeply troubled by the plight of their economy and their own economic prospects.

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    Is Obama Out of Step with America on Foreign Policy?

    The U.S. president’s inaugural address is a speech heard and read around the world, and is interpreted as a sign of America’s intentions going forward. To separate lofty ambitions from more practical realities, it needs to be interpreted in the context of U.S. public opinion.

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    Immigration Rises on Washington’s Agenda, Not the Public’s

    The issue of immigration reform is again a hot topic in Washington, with news of a bipartisan Senate compromise proposal to overhaul immigration laws. But immigration is only a middle-tier issue on the public’s agenda, and it has declined in importance since the end of the Bush administration. In the Pew Research Center’s annual policy […]

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    Tracking for Health

    69% of U.S. adults track a health indicator like weight, diet, exercise routine, or symptom. Of those, half track in their heads, one-third keep notes on paper, and one in five use technology to keep tabs on their health status.

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    A Conversation with Susannah Fox

    Stanford Medicine X is a catalyst for new ideas about the future of medicine and emerging technologies. Stanford Medical Student Joyce Ho interviews Susannah Fox about her upcoming report, “Tracking for Health.”