Brett Favre has thrown more interceptions than anyone else in the history of the National Football League.
But don’t be fooled.
Favre was an all-time great. He holds countless other records including most touchdowns thrown. The man was a wizard. Even if you don’t love his soft touch on the field, you probably enjoyed his blue jean commercials.
Now, that interception record seems like less of a knock on Favre’s skills, doesn’t it? That’s because numbers can be deceiving. Don’t get me wrong. Numbers are important, but they don’t always tell the whole story.
The old adage rings true for all of us:
Numbers never lie, but liars like you sure can number.
We love to push our pre-conceived notions by any means necessary. And we especially love to use numbers to do it.
So, I decided I’ll leave the analysis up to you. You’re in charge here.
What I offer is pure- unadulterated- Information. Today (and two blog days to come) is all about the facts. So, let’s get started.
(Pardon the fluctuation in timing for some of the stats. What am I the polling master?)
7 Factsabout adoption in Arkansas
- Adopted Children make up about 2.6% of children in the households of Arkansas and 2.5% of the households of the USA (2000)
- The adoption percentage of “ever-married” women age 18-44 fluctuated between 1.3 and 2.2 from 1973-2002
- At least half of women in the United States will experience an unplanned pregnancy by age 45
- About 21% of all pregnancies end in abortion
- The Children’s Bureau estimates that there are 400,540 children in the foster care system in the United States (2011)
- 3,732 Children were in foster care in Arkansas on September 30, 2011
Conclusion
So, what do we do with this? That’s for you to decide.
You may have noticed the obvious problem with my plan. I chose these facts out of literally millions that I could have shared. Doesn’t that ruin the integrity of what I’m trying to do here?
Probably, but there is also probably not a single publication on the web that doesn’t have opinion hidden somewhere inside. I’ll see you next week.