Tag: politics

  • Explaining Why Some People Are Losing Their Health Insurance Plans

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    I have received a few questions in the non-blog world about why certain people have been receiving notices in the post that they are about to lose their insurance plans. The short answer for many of those people is that they likely bought individual, private plans and those plans fall short of the new minimum…

  • Scale of Syria’s Refugees

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    Brendan Barry
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    So that civil war in Syria thing, yeah, it’s still going on, folks. And lots of people—7,000,000 of them—have been forced to flee to either external or internal locations. Al Jazeera has attempted to put that number into context for Americans using US census data and maps. Here is a look at both Philadelphia and…

  • Virginia Election Results

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    Last night was election night. Okay, maybe not the big midterm, but there were still a few interesting races. The one I want to look at it, however, is the gubernatorial race in Virginia. Maps are pretty much the default in big, statewide races like these and it is no surprise that the three screenshots here…

  • The Calderon Connections

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    I am not terribly familiar with local politics outside of my local areas. So the background and details of this piece escape me. However, this interactive graphic and story from the Los Angeles Times does a really great job of leading the reader through the story. First, the piece starts with a general overview or…

  • Illegal Arrivals to Australia

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    This article on Yahoo by the AFP has an interesting graphic on the problem facing Australia of illegal arrivals via boat that, in part, probably cost Kevin Rudd and the Labor Party of Australia the recent election. I like the overall graphic, but I feel that the data labels are unnecessary on the line chart…

  • The New American Center

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    NBC News and Esquire magazine published results from their August survey of some 2000+ respondents that attempted to define the New American Center, i.e. the political persuasions of the majority of the country excepting the radical right and the loony left. For the purposes of Coffee Spoons, I am most interested in looking at the…

  • Where Medicaid is Not Expanding is Where it is Needed Most

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    Last summer, the Supreme Court ruled that most of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, was constitutional. The one exception, however, was the plan to force states to expand their Medicaid coverage. Medicaid is the government plan tasked with helping to provide health insurance to the poor. But between the poverty level and…

  • The Republicans Who Support a Clean Budget Resolution

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    Yesterday, we looked at the new Conservative Party of America. But those are the votes that John Boehner fears to upset—and possibly fracture his party and cost him his job—if he should let a clean budget resolution come to the floor and should it pass. But why would it pass if it needs 217 votes…

  • The Conservative Party of America

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    Brendan Barry
    in ,

    We enter our second week of the government shutdown. Of course, blame for the shutdown falls largely upon a small number of conservative Republican members of the House, bolstered by Senator Cruz (R-TX) and his allies in the Senate. But we already know that there are a number of moderate Republicans who want to pass…

  • Paying Federal Employees

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    The Washington Post put together this infographic looking at paydays for federal employees who will still be working during the shutdown, e.g. military service personnel. Of course, if the shutdown drags on, the paychecks for those still working would be delayed. Credit for the piece goes to Lisa Rein and Todd Lindeman.