Four numbers, not as easy as it seems

Longtime reader Aleksander B. wasn't convinced by the following chart shown at the bottom of AFP's infographic about gun control.

He said:

Finally I was able to figure who got some support from NRA. But as a non-US citizen it was hard to get why 86% of republican tag points to huge red part. Then I figured out that smaller value of alpha channel codes the rest of republicans. I think this could be presented in some better way (pie charts are bad in presenting percentages of some subparts of the same pie chart - but adding a tag for 86% while skipping the tag for remaining 14% is cruel).

It's an example of how a simple chart with just four numbers is so hard to understand.

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Here is a different view of the same data, using a similar structure as the form I chose for this recent chart on Swedish trade balance (link).

Comments

[Cody Custis]

This seems like a case where a map of the United States with each representative having a hexagon or block and shading to represent party affiliation / donations would be useful. I predict that most of the donations are to politicians in the West and South.