Posted on 07/02/2017 10:28:07 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
What do you think is the most important issue in American politics today? Criminal justice reform? Health care? Global climate change? Immigration? Gay rights? Economic justice? ISIS? Creeping totalitarianism?
All of those things (and more!) are incredibly important, but they may all be secondary to something else: gerrymandering. And earlier this week, the Supreme Court announced that it was going to decide a case that could potentially reform the practice entirely.
For those not familiar with the term, gerrymandering is the process by which state legislators draw voting district boundaries, for both congressional and state legislature districts. That sounds pretty boring, but in essence the power to draw voting district boundaries is, in many situations, akin to the power to determine who wins elections.
This process usually happens every 10 years, and the party in control of the state legislature is, in most states, the one that's in charge. In theory, re-drawing boundaries happens in order to balance the districts with population changes. Every 10 years, the census data is released, so if a district has grown in size, then the boundaries need to change so that each district in the state has roughly the same number of voters.....
(Excerpt) Read more at rollingstone.com ...
Gerrymandering is A process of deciding districts not THE process. BTaiM, it is hard to see the Court rule in a fashion will entangle it in an infinity of cases wherein the Court has to decide what was partisan and what was not.
It would put and end to ridiculous districts like the one which inflicts Looie the Red from Chicago on the Nation.
I am, in my wiser phase of life, placing more value to the belief that there shouldn’t be political parties.
Nothing in the Constitution states there must be political parties. The Framers warned against parties.
Districts should be drawn so that, within the limits of a State’s own boundaries of course, they have the shortest boundary line length to enclose the correct number of persons.
This will not create regular shapes like squares or hexagons simply because of geography and population distribution; but, the lumpish things that result will be much better than this crap.
Good luck A-holes.
Redistricting is a fact of life, even when the side you are on is disadvantaged...
Some of “this crap” is attempts to follow federal court requirements that come from previous lawsuits about unfair representation and the like.
Why should government respect these establishments of religion when doing so violates the Constitution?
Democrats still seem to feel as if they got a raw deal after the last census. Had they benefitted in any way, I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t be talking about this. This is all about them, not democracy.
This practice is under scrutiny by just about everybody...continuously. It is supposed to happen every ten years, but in between there is constant plotting, sceaming, planning, maneuvering, churning, lying, and manipulating by all interested parties. Ultimately, the courts decide what is going to happen...because the one’s getting screwed always sue. Been going on as long as there have been elections.
Social media is king!
Radio talk shows, YouTubes, rallies, and Deplorable media such as Free Republic have come into their own and are the key to political power -- both locally and nationally.
Spending tens of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars on traditional dishonest and smear advertisements becomes wasted money. The influence and money of powerful oligarchs such as Warren "Golden Sacks" Buffet and George Soros is somewhat neutralized.
Phony political polls and non-stop attacks of a candidate by television networks and newspapers can't stop a powerful candidate or message from winning.
This is the story of Donald J. Trump -- a great message and a great candidate -- a man who pulled in Democrats from Rust Belt States like Wisconsin, Penn, and Michigan.
It is also the case of Georgia 6th, where you had a not-so-strong candidate, but people still turned out to defeat "Nancy Pelosi", and "Hollywood actors and San Francisco politicians trying to steal your vote in Washington".
The rise of social media gives democracy a second chance to defeat the oligarchy and restore the rule of law and Constitutional government.
It's also the worse nightmare for fat cats and swamp dogs getting rich and gorging themselves at the public trough.
I have heard of a district in Texas that is ONE HOUSE WIDE in certain places.
I know of no districts that were carved out to preserve a white majority. Not to say they don’t exist, just that I am not aware of any currently.
But I do know of several contorted districts that were carved out to create oxymoronically-named ‘majority minority’ districts.
The left had better be extremely careful what they wish for.
Around the time of the last couple of censuses, they were pushing hard to base the census on a statistical sampling rather than an actual count. They can manipulate statistics to "show" that there are more traditionally Democrat constituents (e.g. homeless and welfare queens) than there really are--so they can then draw Democrat districts that contain fewer people than there really are. This way, they can get more representatives than their real numbers warrant.
The discipline of statistics was invented because it is impossible to count in every situation. It was not invented to bypass counting. Whenever it is possible to count, it is preferable to do so.
I’ve described the Maryland district map as if a monkey vomited on the map and then someone drew circles around the chunks
Both parties support gerrymandering because it basically locks most districts as “safe” for one or the other; now the complaint from blacks is that with gerrymandering they are consigned to a small number of safe districts which are easy for everyone else to ignore.
A few years ago a Chicago paper had a computer program draw the 50 Chicago Aldermanic districts based on only 2 criteria:
Equal population
As compact as possible
The result was that the racial/ethnic makeup would not change at all. The only thing that would change would be protection of powerful incumbents.
In both 2001 and 2011 I did the same with the census data for the IL State House and Senate and Congress. The single biggest change would be the lack of protection for incumbents, both R and D; And the loss of power by Boss Madigan.
It would change both R and D districts to be competitive... many more purple districts. Even when Republicans are in the minority in Illinois the incumbent in a safe R district does not want run in a competitive district and have to work for the votes ... even if the many purple districts could mean an net increase in R districts.
As the Republican Chicago City GOP Chairman said: I’d rather have control of the minority party than just be one of many leaders of a majority party. I can get more jobs and contracts from the majority party when I control the minority party.
I agree. Just program a computer to “create” voting districts:
1. Using school districts as “building blocks”
2. To assemble contiguous districts
3. With roughly equal populations
4. Where voting district perimeters are minimized.
Problem solved....
I agree. Just program a computer to “create” voting districts:
1. Using school districts as “building blocks”
2. To assemble contiguous districts
3. With roughly equal populations
4. Where voting district perimeters are minimized.
Problem solved....
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