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Significant Digits For Tuesday, July 14, 2015

You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the telling numbers tucked inside the news.

0.5 percent

The President granted clemency to 46 people Monday who were in prison for drug offenses. This brings the percent of commutation requests granted over the course of his presidency to 0.5 percent, higher than both President Bushes but less than President Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan or Clinton. [FiveThirtyEight]


11 percent

According to a new poll, 11 percent of Americans feel the U.S. will never recover from the 2008 financial crisis. [YouGov]


13 runs

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is running for president, and the guy has experience: he’s run for office 13 times, winning 11 of those races. Donald Trump’s record…doesn’t quite compare. [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]


19 times

By one count, the number of times Walker has tweeted about his haircut. [Christopher Ingraham]


83 percent

“We should just give people with PTSD some MDMA” may seem like something a person who was on MDMA would say, but there’s legitimate evidence that it may aid some people recovering from a traumatic event. One study found 83 percent of patients on MDMA saw a reduction in symptoms. Now there’s going to be a clinical study in Canada looking into this further. [MacLean’s]


$5 million

50 Cent owes a woman $5 million after a judge found he violated her privacy when releasing a private sex tape. In plausibly related news: 50 Cent declared bankruptcy Monday. [The Wall Street Journal]


$5.9 million

The City of New York agreed to settle with the family of Eric Garner, who died after being placed in a chokehold by the NYPD, for $5.9 million. The city had until Friday to reach a settlement or else face a lawsuit. [The Guardian]


$10 million

I am a long-time advocate for innovative biological solutions to difficult biological problems. So of course I’m thrilled to hear of a Texas plan to spend $10 million introducing an invasive European wasp to fight back against an invasive European weed that’s clogging up the Rio Grande. [Bloomberg]


65 million

Netflix is expected to announce it has 65 million worldwide subscribers Wednesday, which sent the price of its shares up 5 percent. [Quartz]


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Walt Hickey was FiveThirtyEight’s chief culture writer.

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