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Posted on July 15, 2009 | tags

 
 

Chatter, U.S.: Gee, House Republicans, when you explain health care like this …

healthcare0716
  • Wow. Where to start, where to start … We are not going to blame the Democrats for coming up with a complex, bureaucracy-filled health care plan. NO. We’re going to blame the Republicans for coming up with the most complicated, noise filled graphic possible to explain their point. You can make anything seem like the scariest thing ever when you make it look like this. Gray background? Not necessary. Loud, garish colors? Even less so. This is politics through bad design. (Grab the full PDF to get an idea.) source
 

20 Responses to Gee, House Republicans, when you explain health care like this …

  1. Name says:

    It’s funny how you’re so frustrated with their bias yet you run one of the most biased “news” sites I’ve ever seen. I fell in love with this site because of it’s no-personality, no-bias, ‘just short news’ form at the begin­ning but now it’s full of words like “OMG” and “sez” and liberal leaning bias. I wish it were more profes­sional and less personal. The last thing the web needs is more inter­net meme’s and bias, now you’re just one of millions instead of one in a million. Taking you off as my homepage.

  2. We never have claimed to be anything more than we ever were. There were no claims of lack of bias (claims, in our humble opinion, that are always tough to live by, due to the constant belief that the mainstream media is liberal or that Fox news is conser­v­a­tive), so we never made them. We figured that our readers would figure it out on their own.

    Nor were there claims that we wouldn’t have person­al­ity in our posts. The over-the-top, ironic use of OMGs and the use of the word “sez” are inten­tional designed to play into that. As we slowly get more staff onto the site, they’re going to put their person­al­ity into what they say, too. There’s a freak­ing cartoon robot on the bottom of the page! If you don’t want person­al­ity, look elsewhere.

    All we claimed to be doing was giving people infor­ma­tion in a short way. Nothing more, nothing less.

    We’re sad that you’re disap­pointed but would like to point out that in the case of this partic­u­lar post, 1) It’s clearly marked as opinion piece, 2) We said that we’re not attack­ing the Democ­rats for the bill itself, but the Repub­li­cans for cloud­ing the issue with this graphic (because making a graphic designed to scare people is terri­ble politics) and 3) We never once actually offered an opinion on the bill but instead the under­handed tactics of releas­ing a graphic like this. It’s shady to design something so clearly constructed to play on people’s fears. That’s why this post went onto the site.

    Truth of the matter is, this format isn’t going to please every­one, and I’m sorry it doesn’t please you. I just hope you recon­sider and also consider that you may be remem­ber­ing a past that never actually existed.

  3. “OK, another inter­est­ing anima­tion, but we wonder: Is this guy fiscally conser­v­a­tive? He doesn’t mention a polit­i­cal persua­sion in any of his videos but they mostly seem to be anti-Obama. For our curios­ity, we just want to know whether they’re pushing an agenda. No matter which way you lean, keep making them. They’re good” http://shortformblog.com/chatter/more-penny-mat...

    So biased…

  4. pwallen says:

    OMG, you have person­al­ity!!!! Stop this at once.

  5. Actually, the person­al­ity is pretty much the main reason I read this site. For what it’s worth.

  6. Wow. I’ll just toss my two-cents in: the site is clearly built off of person­al­ity (blurbs, comments and every­thing else that makes social media fun). It links to dry news sources if you like that, but it still informs you of those stories in… what’s the word… short form! I love that there is a site that hunts down inter­est­ing data and stories I wouldn’t have found on my own. And here’s a shocker: I’m a conser­v­a­tive. How can you learn if you never hear any opinions but yours?

  7. David Putney says:

    This graphic is like a rorschach test for your politics. Leftist look at it and say “Repub­li­cans can’t design.” Conser­v­a­tives look at it and see it as a comic riff on a the worst bill in Ameri­can history.

  8. Heh heh. Well-put.

  9. Actually, the person­al­ity is pretty much the main reason I read this site. For what it’s worth.

  10. Wow. I’ll just toss my two-cents in: the site is clearly built off of person­al­ity (blurbs, comments and every­thing else that makes social media fun). It links to dry news sources if you like that, but it still informs you of those stories in… what’s the word… short form! I love that there is a site that hunts down inter­est­ing data and stories I wouldn’t have found on my own. And here’s a shocker: I’m a conser­v­a­tive. How can you learn if you never hear any opinions but yours?

  11. David Putney says:

    This graphic is like a rorschach test for your politics. Leftist look at it and say “Repub­li­cans can’t design.” Conser­v­a­tives look at it and see it as a comic riff on a the worst bill in Ameri­can history.

  12. Heh heh. Well-put.

  13. Name says:

    It’s funny how you’re so frustrated with their bias yet you run one of the most biased “news” sites I’ve ever seen. I fell in love with this site because of it’s no-personality, no-bias, ‘just short news’ form at the begin­ning but now it’s full of words like “OMG” and “sez” and liberal leaning bias. I wish it were more profes­sional and less personal. The last thing the web needs is more inter­net meme’s and bias, now you’re just one of millions instead of one in a million. Taking you off as my homepage.

  14. We never have claimed to be anything more than we ever were. There were no claims of lack of bias (claims, in our humble opinion, that are always tough to live by, due to the constant belief that the mainstream media is liberal or that Fox news is conser­v­a­tive), so we never made them. We figured that our readers would figure it out on their own.

    Nor were there claims that we wouldn’t have person­al­ity in our posts. The over-the-top, ironic use of OMGs and the use of the word “sez” are inten­tion­ally designed to play into that. As we slowly get more staff onto the site, they’re going to put their person­al­ity into what they say, too. There’s a freak­ing cartoon robot on the bottom of the page! If you don’t want person­al­ity, look elsewhere.

    All we claimed to be doing was giving people infor­ma­tion in a short way. Nothing more, nothing less.

    We’re sad that you’re disap­pointed but would like to point out that in the case of this partic­u­lar post, 1) It’s clearly marked as an opinion piece, 2) We said that we’re not attack­ing the Democ­rats for the bill itself, but the Repub­li­cans for cloud­ing the issue with this graphic (because making a graphic designed to scare people is terri­ble politics) and 3) We never once actually offered an opinion on the bill but instead the under­handed tactics of releas­ing a graphic like this. It’s shady to design something so clearly constructed to play on people’s fears. That’s why this post went onto the site.

    Truth of the matter is, this format isn’t going to please every­one, and I’m sorry it doesn’t please you. I just hope you recon­sider and also consider that you may be remem­ber­ing a past that never actually existed.

  15. “OK, another inter­est­ing anima­tion, but we wonder: Is this guy fiscally conser­v­a­tive? He doesn’t mention a polit­i­cal persua­sion in any of his videos but they mostly seem to be anti-Obama. For our curios­ity, we just want to know whether they’re pushing an agenda. No matter which way you lean, keep making them. They’re good” http://shortformblog.com/chatter/more-penny-mat...

    So biased…

  16. pwallen says:

    OMG, you have person­al­ity!!!! Stop this at once.

  17. Actually, the person­al­ity is pretty much the main reason I read this site. For what it’s worth.

  18. Wow. I’ll just toss my two-cents in: the site is clearly built off of person­al­ity (blurbs, comments and every­thing else that makes social media fun). It links to dry news sources if you like that, but it still informs you of those stories in… what’s the word… short form! I love that there is a site that hunts down inter­est­ing data and stories I wouldn’t have found on my own. And here’s a shocker: I’m a conser­v­a­tive. How can you learn if you never hear any opinions but yours?

  19. David Putney says:

    This graphic is like a rorschach test for your politics. Leftist look at it and say “Repub­li­cans can’t design.” Conser­v­a­tives look at it and see it as a comic riff on a the worst bill in Ameri­can history.

  20. Heh heh. Well-put.

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