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Gerrymandering
Gerrymandering, Texas-style: http://www.swingstateproject.com/showComment.do?commentId=255634
Yeah, it's happening again. Once a decade, plus anytime legislators feel like it.
Yes, you read that right. They're cracking Travis County--in other words, Austin--five ways, connecting the pieces with extremely Republican areas in the suburbs and beyond, basically ensuring that the Republicans will control all of it.
And other similar stuff.
Edit: Changed title to remove specific mention of Texas and also changed category to "politics".
Yeah, it's happening again. Once a decade, plus anytime legislators feel like it.
Yes, you read that right. They're cracking Travis County--in other words, Austin--five ways, connecting the pieces with extremely Republican areas in the suburbs and beyond, basically ensuring that the Republicans will control all of it.
And other similar stuff.
Edit: Changed title to remove specific mention of Texas and also changed category to "politics".
Comments
That said, don't expect something that much better, since the Republicans control both houses of the state legislature, as well as the governor and lieutenant governor positions.
governor and lieutenant governor positions.>>
Now in what sort of scenario would this not get passed?
Do it yourself! Come to Dave's Redistricting App and make a map of your own state with (1) the correct number of districts, AND (2) an embedded picture of Poseidon fighting a giant wombat.
Or, if your state is huge, pick a smaller state. Note that your districts need not be U.S. House districts but could be state senate or state house/assembly districts. Just go check out Wikipedia to see how many districts you need.
(Remember that these aren't the official Texas maps, BTW.)
I almost did over a decade ago though.
If remember correctly, about five or six years ago controversy over Texas state Republicans' redistricting plans actually led to Democratic legislators fleeing to Oklahoma (similarly to what happened in Wisconsin earlier this year). I guess a lot of Democrats thought that plan was particularly bad since it did not take place after a census year so it seemed more obviously political.
I like the idea of switching to nonpartisan commissions for determining districts (like what Iowa has), but I guess that such a measure would probably require a majority party to willingly give up that power and I doubt that kind of thing would happen in most states, including Texas.
Of course, I am not necessarily that knowledgeable about redistricting so that kind of thing might actually have happened in many states already.
Hmm... a government run by supervillains and retired soldiers. I know which party I'm voting for.
And in reality, politicians are generally neither chaotic stupid evil nor godly good. Most of them are a mix of good and bad intentions.
LouieW > I like the idea of switching to nonpartisan commissions for determining
districts (like what Iowa has), but I guess that such a measure would
probably require a majority party to willingly give up that power and I
doubt that kind of thing would happen in most states, including Texas.
Actually, Iowa has it even stricter than that--all district lines MUST be drawn along county lines. Obviously this doesn't work for all areas (for example, Queens County in New York contains multiple congressional districts worth of people within its borders), but anyone with half a brain can come up with variations on this theme.
I'll leave you to the nightmares of a tendril'd monster snaking into your neighborhood.
Yeah, I know. bree_tightlip.jpg
So I guess I live in the 12.
Lol it looks like an erection/duck head
IJBM: Someone in the North Carolina General Assembly is possessed by Dracula.