How Democrats are 'unilaterally disarming' in the redistricting wars

[In It to Win It]

POLITICO via Yahoo News

Oregon Democrats had finally secured total control of redistricting for the first time in decades.

Then, just months before they were set to draw new maps, they gave it away.

In a surprise that left Democrats from Salem to Washington baffled and angry, the state House speaker handed the GOP an effective veto over the districts in exchange for a pledge to stop stymieing her legislative agenda with delay tactics. The reaction from some of Oregon's Democratic House delegation was unsparing: “That was like shooting yourself in the head,” Rep. Kurt Schrader told POLITICO. Rep. Peter DeFazio seethed: “It was just an abysmally stupid move on her part.”

Yet what happened this spring in Oregon is just one example, though perhaps the most extreme one, of a larger trend vexing Democratic strategists and lawmakers focused on maximizing the party’s gains in redistricting. In key states over the past decade, Democrats have gained control of state legislatures and governorships that have long been in charge of drawing new maps — only to cede that authority, often to independent commissions tasked with drawing political boundaries free of partisan interference.

Supporters of these initiatives say it's good governance to bar politicians from drawing districts for themselves and their party. But exasperated Democrats counter that it has left them hamstrung in the battle to hold the House, by diluting or negating their ability to gerrymander in the way Republicans plan to do in many red states. And with the House so closely divided, Democrats will need every last advantage to cling to their majority in 2022.

“We Democrats are cursed with this blindness about good government,” said Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia, a Democratic state that will nonetheless see its congressional map drawn by a newly created independent commission.

[zaj]

1. Independent Commissions protect democracy

Dems drawing Dem favored maps create a cover for GOP abuses.

[OneBro]

2. The GOP does not need or care about cover for their abuses.

When repubs are in power, they ignore Democrats and abuse their power to entrench their power. As the article notes, some Democrats are understandably frustrated that when Democrats are in power we aim to - yet again - hope repubs will play fair next time based on our example. Rinse, repeat.

For some reason, this reminds me of an old Garfield cartoon strip. A bird politely says hello to Garfield. Garfield, being a cat, promptly eats the bird. Another bird shows up and, angry that Garfield has eaten the first bird, gives Garfield a piece of its mind. Garfield, still a cat, eats THAT bird. A third bird shows up, furiously rolling up its sleeves as it yells at Garfield about the first two birds. Garfield turns to the audience and says “I love this family.”

Republicans are Garfield. Republicans are the scorpion that promptly stings the turtle that kindly gave it a ride across the pond. Republicans wear brass knuckles in their boxing gloves, and they’d rather poison the well if they don’t control the pump. Some Democrats are simply saying Democracy will NOT survive if we keep running the same game plan whereby repubs redraw the maps as they wish while in power, while Democrats cede such power to “independent commissions.”

[KPN]

3. Cover for abuses? They are and have been totally unabashed about their abuses and even flaunt

it. How about we even up the playing field before giving up our hard earned advantage. Geesh.