Hey, maybe Republican lawmakers can flee to Texas to prevent a quorum.
Or would the Rats frown on such a tactic?
Too bad the constitution didn't make all House delegates "at large" throughout the state. Both sides play this redistricting game and it always adds up to the same thing: statewide majority-party incumbent protection.
Dem gains in the Pennsylvania legislature are irrelevant for two reasons: (1) The GOP still controls the state senate by a 29 to 21 vote margin, and the state senate has to go along with any redistricting, so it's DOA in the Keystone State; (2) With their four seat gain in this past election the Dems have pretty much maximized their potential in Pennsylvania. Now, to be sure, they could redistrict Gerlach out of a seat, if they left themselves several quite marginal districts, but if they did redistrict Pennsylvania they would surely focus on shoring up the Altmire (PA-04), Carney (PA-10), and Holden (PA-17) districts. There are not enough Democrats to do that and also target additional GOP seats.
Beyond that, there are only five states - tops - where Dems control both chambers of the legislature and now have the governor's mansion where they might benefit from a re-redistricting. One is New Mexico. The others are:
Colorado: But again Dems have just about maximized their potential. If they re-redistrict they will look to make the Salazar (CO-03) and Perlmutter (CO-07) seats more secure long before they target the three remaining GOP seats.
Illinois: Again, they would first look to shore up Bean (IL-08) and there's really not much more they could pick up - two seats at best (one in the Chicago suburbs, by making Kirk's IL-10 more Dem and perhaps one downstate by sweeping together most of the Dems now distributed between IL-15 and IL-19). The leaders of state legislature and Governor Blagojevich have all said they aren't interested, though.
Louisiana: The Dems could give themselves a shot at a couple more seats if they really chop up the district lines, but Governor Blanco is hardly in the political position to do that and she will lose to Jindal next year.
West Virginia: The Dems could try to target Capito but they'd probably fail no matter how they redraw the map and might instead lose one of their own. And there's no sign of motivation to revisit the district lines.
And that's it. Everywhere else, the Dems either passed the current maps, or an independent commission draws lines, or there's still divided state government. So, there's really not much to worry about. Heather Wilson is it.
Why don't we just start calling it, "Gerry-pandering?"
We'll have to see if this actually happens. Talk is cheap and Bill Richardson doesn't want to taint his record by being really partisan. He has presidential aspirations and trying to re-district.
Re-districting is not a sure win,its what cost Gekas his seat here in central Pa.
When they remove all the whites from her district to defeat her, don't expect the Supreme Court to rule that this is racially unfair as they did with Henry Bonilla's district. Racism is a one-way street for honkies only.
When people can’t win an election ....I guess the next best thing is to “Re-redistrict.” In my case “Re-redistricting is better than being dimissed and dislike...even physcially threatened.