12 charts that show American politics has gone off the rails

1) Congress is less popular than Richard Nixon was during Watergate, or than the banks were during the financial crisis

Sen. Michael Bennet/Washington Post

2) In the 2010 election, 0.26 percent of the population gave 68 percent of the money

Good Magazine

3) Congress is more polarized than at any time since Reconstruction

Data from Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal

4) Many states are trying to make it harder for Americans to vote

Brennan Center

5) Democratic and Republican voters are more polarized than ever

Pew

6) Increasingly large numbers of Democrats and Republicans view the other party as threat to the country

Pew

7) Liberals and conservatives live in very different informational worlds

8) In some states, gerrymandering is rendering the will of the electorate almost irrelevant

Mother Jones

9) There were more filibusters between 2009 and 2010 than in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s combined

Data: US Senate

10) The amount of dark money in politics is exploding

From 40 charts that explain money in politics

11) The biggest political donors are extremely polarized

The Sunlight Foundation

12) Trust in government is at about its lowest point in 40 years

Pew

WATCH: 'The decline of American democracy in one graph'

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