Gerrymandering has been a part of American politics as long as there has been American politics. It has been a focus of some of the concern expressed by proponents of Prop 20 and opponents of Prop 27. We should look a bit closer at what gerrymandering is, how it effects California, and how it effects the nation.
The first efforts at gerrymandering came in Virginia, when Patrick Henry and the anti-Federalists attempted to draw the Congressional districts in Virginia in a manner to prevent the election of James Madison to the First Congress. The name came about for Governor Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts after the 1810 redistricting, where one of the districts resembled a salamander.
In recent years, gerrymandering has taken on the meaning of redistricting to produce a specific electoral result, whether it is to ensure incumbency. While creating districts to ensure specific racial representation is not Constitutional, partisan redistricting to the same effect is allowed.
Taking into account some suggestions and comments, I made some changes to my previous attempt at redistricting California. I conceded an additional 2 seats to the GOP, which concomitantly makes a number of other seats more strongly Democratic. The additional 2 safe GOP seats are CA-4 and CA-48. Here's what version 2 looks like, overall:
I decided to try my hand at redistricting California's Congressional districts for 2010-2012, using Dave's Redistricting App. After playing around with it a bit, here's what the map I came up with looks like overall:
Here's the 2008 Obama/McCain vote in California, on the precinct level:
If he were still at the Hotline this would be more specific, but unlike so many of the California punditocracy, he knows what a wave election means.
California: As unpopular as Bush supposedly has been in California, he only lost the state by 11 points in both 2000 and 2004. So what happens with McCain in '08? I think Obama's margin in this state will tell us a lot about Democratic enthusiasm among the base. Anything above 15 points for Obama probably means he will have some coattails down the ballot. And frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if some two to four GOP incumbents go down, shocking folks in Washington (Reps. Mary Bono-Mack? David Dreier?) No one is safe in this Blue state.
As we know, the latest Field Poll had Obama up by 22. And that big a spread is going to cause some disruption.
I hear that Dana Rohrabacher dropped a last-minute mailer to Republicans, imploring them to turn out. The latest registration numbers show that Dan Lungren is in serious, serious trouble. This is not going to be a normal election year in California. And it's going to put the lie to the primary rationale for redistricting that Arnold Schwarzenegger is peddling to reporters.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said the Kremlin in Russia sees more turnover than the statehouse in Sacramento, as he made the case for Proposition 11 Thursday in a conference call.
"We have to make our politicians responsive to the people, not to the party," Schwarzenegger said, joined by state AARP president Jeannine English and national AARP CEO Bill Novelli.
Well, the Kremlin is going to see some shakeups this year. I don't know if people are going to make the connection between all that turnover and the inherent fallacy that re-gerrymandering would allow for more competition, but maybe some of that late money flowing to No on Prop. 11 can make that case. Because the facts are that the Yacht Party is on the verge of being wiped out, at the state and federal level. And no redistricting had anything to do with it.
You can play a game of redistricting at www.redistrictinggame.com
Click "Play the Game" below in the link
In round 1, you make the population equal in each district. You then submit it to the legislature for approval, the governor for the signature, and the courts for challenges
In round 2, you do a partisan gerrymandering, where you make it so someone of the opposing party will get ousted in the next election. You then submit it to the legislature for approval, the governor for the signature, and the courts for challenges
In round 3, you do a bipartisan gerrymandering, where you make sure all the parties have at least 55% representation in their district. You then submit it to the legislature for approval, the governor for the signature, and the courts for challenges
In round 4, not only do you protect the incumbents, but you have to comply with the Voting Rights Act, where you ensure that blacks are fairly represented. You then submit it to the legislature for approval, the governor for the signature, and the courts for challenges
In round 5, you do population equality again, but this time it gets approved by an independent commission before going to the legislature for approval. If the legislature votes no, the courts can still approve it
To make it easy, you only have to play with 4 districts in each round (except round 4, which has 5 districts). This game is fun and informative, what did you think?
Gerrymandering has been a part of American politics as long as there has been American politics. It has been a focus of some of the concern expressed by proponents of Prop 20 and opponents of Prop 27. We should look a bit closer at what gerrymandering is, how it effects California, and how it effects the nation.
