Gerrymandering

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Typhoon
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Gerrymandering

Post by Typhoon »

Quanta Mag | How to Quantify (and Fight) Gerrymandering
Partisan gerrymandering — the practice of drawing voting districts to give one political party an unfair edge — is one of the few political issues that voters of all stripes find common cause in condemning. Voters should choose their elected officials, the thinking goes, rather than elected officials choosing their voters. The Supreme Court agrees, at least in theory: In 1986 it ruled that partisan gerrymandering, if extreme enough, is unconstitutional.

Yet in that same ruling, the court declined to strike down two Indiana maps under consideration, even though both “used every trick in the book,” according to a paper in the University of Chicago Law Review. And in the decades since then, the court has failed to throw out a single map as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander.
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NapLajoieonSteroids
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

It's condemned by both sides thoroughly because it's not a real issue.

And it's most "extensive practice" is tied to the civil rights era- you get rid of gerrymandering, and the number of black representatives in congress drops like a rock as a large number of them enjoy seats solely because of court-mandated gerrymandering.
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Re: Gerrymandering

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Would you provide a source re "court mandated gerrymandering".
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Re: Gerrymandering

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Typhoon wrote:Would you provide a source re "court mandated gerrymandering".
Fortson v Dorsey in 1965 required strict-equipopulous redistricting while Thornburg v Gingles in 1985 mandated minority-majority districts. I'm sure there are other cases.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

There have been two election cycles in the last 30 years where the Democrats won a plurality of votes but didn't capture the majority of congressional seats- 1996 and 2012.

In '96, their plurality amounted to around 60 thousands votes from a pool of approximately 100 million votes cast. In 2012 it amounted to the Democrats getting an amount of votes about 1% greater than that of the Republicans.

Even if we switched to a proportional representation system applied to all states, the Republicans would've kept the majority in the congress. Instead of 242 to 193, it likely would've looked like 222 to 213.

Before anyone cries foul on a missing twenty seats, go back in time and apply the same system: there were years in recent past (like 1984) where Republicans missed out on 25-30 seats....this is not a new phenomena no matter who is in charge of the map.
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noddy
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by noddy »

this is the same in australia.

if you dislike who wins its called Gerrymandering, if you like who wins its called Protecting Minorities.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

Earlier I said it was not a real problem, which thinking about it is a bit too glib; it may be more appropriate to say it's more of an antique practice which creates annoyances. It is why you can always find a consensus on its wretchedness (as long as we don't toss out the results where one party or another benefits from it.) :D
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by noddy »

in my local experience it can only help if the election is close , it never saves a bad party which has eroded its own base and lost the swinging voters.

this is why its not as big a concern as the bitter partisans on the losing side might rant about during the post election venting period
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Re: Gerrymandering

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Our trouble is, on that long list of troubles obviously, is how tough it has become to remove congressmen from office. House of representative incumbents have a >95% chance of being reelected. Once they are in, that's it, unless they get caught up in something stupid and the national media picks up on it.

This arrangement is not good for anyone and we could, among other things:

- use ordinal balloting
- establish term limits and the like to cycle people through instead of encouraging lifelong careers
- adopt nonpartisan blanket primaries for elections in one-party areas

With gerrymandering, it would be harder to act in such a way if you increased the number of representatives (though that comes with its own problems)

or adopted certain, agreed upon procedures incl./algorithm to divvy up the map.

Thing is, there is nonpartisan way to solve gerrymandering- and there's no way in hell that whatever is adopted will not be manipulated.

It's one of those iron rules of...errm :? ...iron: any algorithm which can be manipulated will be & anything attached to politics will be used politically.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Nonc Hilaire »

What is ordinal balloting?
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Re: Gerrymandering

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NapLajoieonSteroids wrote: - use ordinal balloting
- establish term limits and the like to cycle people through instead of encouraging lifelong careers
- adopt nonpartisan blanket primaries for elections in one-party areas
Surely Nap knows better than to make silly suggestions like this and understands the deep reasons why the system was designed as it is. The American electoral process is perfect and must remain immutable.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Doc »

Nonc Hilaire wrote:What is ordinal balloting?
Rank your choices in order.
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Re: Gerrymandering

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NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:Our trouble is, on that long list of troubles obviously, is how tough it has become to remove congressmen from office. House of representative incumbents have a >95% chance of being reelected. Once they are in, that's it, unless they get caught up in something stupid and the national media picks up on it.

This arrangement is not good for anyone and we could, among other things:

- use ordinal balloting
- establish term limits and the like to cycle people through instead of encouraging lifelong careers
- adopt nonpartisan blanket primaries for elections in one-party areas

With gerrymandering, it would be harder to act in such a way if you increased the number of representatives (though that comes with its own problems)

or adopted certain, agreed upon procedures incl./algorithm to divvy up the map.

Thing is, there is nonpartisan way to solve gerrymandering- and there's no way in hell that whatever is adopted will not be manipulated.

It's one of those iron rules of...errm :? ...iron: any algorithm which can be manipulated will be & anything attached to politics will be used politically.
I have a better simpler solution Nap Make air conditioning illegal in the district of Corruption. The Captial had none until the 1930 Before that Congress only met for a few months a years
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Nonc Hilaire »

Doc wrote:
Nonc Hilaire wrote:What is ordinal balloting?
Rank your choices in order.
Thx.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by noddy »

Nonc Hilaire wrote:
Doc wrote:
Nonc Hilaire wrote:What is ordinal balloting?
Rank your choices in order.
Thx.
we call it 'preferential voting' and you can either fill it out youself or let your main preference chose for you

if you do fill it all out yourself it does stop parties from horse trading odious coalitions on you and that does weaken their gerrymandering power.

in my recent election the centre right tried to do a deal with the xenophobic right but preferential voting let the population put the latter party last and ruin that plan, so they lost badly.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

We could also do well with beating back single member district-ing in some areas and go back to multimember districts. Ordinal balloting/ranked ballots, whatever you'd like to call it, would work better in that sort of set up. Those areas which remain single member districts could adopt alternative voting as a method to try and keep competition fresh.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

Doc wrote:
NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:Our trouble is, on that long list of troubles obviously, is how tough it has become to remove congressmen from office. House of representative incumbents have a >95% chance of being reelected. Once they are in, that's it, unless they get caught up in something stupid and the national media picks up on it.

This arrangement is not good for anyone and we could, among other things:

- use ordinal balloting
- establish term limits and the like to cycle people through instead of encouraging lifelong careers
- adopt nonpartisan blanket primaries for elections in one-party areas

With gerrymandering, it would be harder to act in such a way if you increased the number of representatives (though that comes with its own problems)

or adopted certain, agreed upon procedures incl./algorithm to divvy up the map.

Thing is, there is nonpartisan way to solve gerrymandering- and there's no way in hell that whatever is adopted will not be manipulated.

It's one of those iron rules of...errm :? ...iron: any algorithm which can be manipulated will be & anything attached to politics will be used politically.
I have a better simpler solution Nap Make air conditioning illegal in the district of Corruption. The Captial had none until the 1930 Before that Congress only met for a few months a years
Throw in paying appellate and supreme court justices in potatoes and I think we have solved half the nonsense. :D
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Doc »

NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:
Doc wrote:
NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:Our trouble is, on that long list of troubles obviously, is how tough it has become to remove congressmen from office. House of representative incumbents have a >95% chance of being reelected. Once they are in, that's it, unless they get caught up in something stupid and the national media picks up on it.

This arrangement is not good for anyone and we could, among other things:

- use ordinal balloting
- establish term limits and the like to cycle people through instead of encouraging lifelong careers
- adopt nonpartisan blanket primaries for elections in one-party areas

With gerrymandering, it would be harder to act in such a way if you increased the number of representatives (though that comes with its own problems)

or adopted certain, agreed upon procedures incl./algorithm to divvy up the map.

Thing is, there is nonpartisan way to solve gerrymandering- and there's no way in hell that whatever is adopted will not be manipulated.

It's one of those iron rules of...errm :? ...iron: any algorithm which can be manipulated will be & anything attached to politics will be used politically.
I have a better simpler solution Nap Make air conditioning illegal in the district of Corruption. The Captial had none until the 1930 Before that Congress only met for a few months a years
Throw in paying appellate and supreme court justices in potatoes and I think we have solved half the nonsense. :D
That would be very fitting since much of the time we seem to get Mr. Potato Head justice
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Mr. Perfect »

-The White House cannot be Gerrymandered
-The Senate cannot be Gerrymandered
-Governorships cannot be Gerrymandered
-Most state legislator seats cannot be Gerrymandered

Mostly a non-issue
Censorship isn't necessary
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Typhoon »

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Re: Gerrymandering

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The SCOTGUS announced that it would hear Gill vs. Whitford, a partisan gerrymandering case from Wisconsin, raising the possibility that it could rule on the constitutionality of political parties drawing state districts to their overwhelming advantage. While the Supreme Court has overturned race-based gerrymandering before, to date it has not struck down a plan because of its partisanship.
Nature | With algorithms in hand, scientists are looking to make elections in the United States more representative.

Image

Seriously?
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Re: Gerrymandering

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The states get to decide on how they draw the congressional districts. Thus assuring that a party that neglects a given state from the national level will suffer at the national level.
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Re: Gerrymandering

Post by Typhoon »

Doc wrote:The states get to decide on how they draw the congressional districts. Thus assuring that a party that neglects a given state from the national level will suffer at the national level.
My understanding is that in many states, the majority party has the right to draw the congressional districts.
The 12th District looks like a fractal.

This strikes me as a conflict of interest and it the reason, I will speculate, as to why the SCOTUS agreed to hear the case.
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