Taken from an article titled "A new day for U.S. atheists?" written by Michael Conlon, Religion Writer and located here: http://uk.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUKTRE52T47G20090330

For some atheists in the United States it's a bright new day with the election of President Barack Obama and a move away from religion-shaped government policies of past years.

Since then Obama reversed restrictions on stem cell embryonic research and the White House has signaled more liberal attitudes toward gays. Obama is a member of the United Church of Christ but has said he was raised in a family where values counted for more than religious identity.

[Is this really a sign of more enlightened attitudes towards the athiest/agnostic society in America?]

Kenneth Bronstein, president of the New York group, said there has been a dramatic shift in attitudes about atheism which he attributes to former President George Bush whose policies he said fed an appetite for change.

A recent report from Connecticut's Trinity College found 12 percent of Americans were atheists, agnostics or doubters. It put the number of self-professed atheists at 2.3 percent, another 4.3 percent said there is no way to know if God exists. About 6 percent said they were not sure about a deity.
[12% amounts to 36,458,956.8 Americans. That is not an insignificant number. According to U.S. Religious Landscape Survey (http://religions.pewforum.org/) 21.4% of the country does not self-identify as Christian.]

"There are very few atheists in America, and they are, in general, not admired," [Robert Altemeyer of the University of Manitoba, who has studied U.S. nonbelievers, says]. "The shifting that is occurring, which both helped Obama win and which will be reinforced by the perception that stem cell research should go ahead, etc., is a movement away from institutionalized Christianity to less participatory and 'in name only' Christianity," he said.

[Assuming Altemeyer is correct is that a a good thing for non-believers and/or non-christians?]