The basic US problem is gerrymandering: Dems need to beat GOP by 7.5% to get a House majority

[muriel_volestrangler]

The Democratic popular vote in the House elections was 49.2%, compared to the Republican 48.0% - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2012 . But the GOP won 33 more seats. From the list of House elections results, we see that, to take 17 seats from the GOP, Dems need to overcome margins of up to 6.3% in the 17 closest districts. Beating the Republicans by 1.2% isn't enough; it needs to be 7.5%. Nearly double the margin Obama beat Romney by. More than he beat McCain by. The last time a presidential vote was won by more than that, it was Clinton over Dole. The Dem margin in 2006 (7.9%) would give them a majority of just a couple of seats. The margin in 2008 (10.5%) would give them a seat margin of about 30 - less than the Republicans have from the 2012 election, despite the Republicans losing the popular vote.

And that's because of gerrymandering. Which, as Sam Wang shows (though it's obvious to us all), is overwhelmingly done by Republicans.

That's what has given Republicans, who lost the popular House vote, so much power in these fiscal negotiations. It also means that, rather than electing some moderate Republicans who have to be centrist to keep their electorate happy, they can all be extremist Tea Party followers. About the only thing that makes Republicans lose House elections is saying something evil and unhinged about rape.

US democracy will not work until gerrymandering is outlawed. Partisan politicians cannot be left in charge of setting election boundaries. It's worked so well for Republicans, they now want to use those bogus boundaries to give them electoral college votes in states like Pennsylvania.

The American system for setting district boundaries is literally unbelievable to many outside the country. Tell them that politicians get to do it, and they'll think their informant is mistaken. Show them the resulting shapes of districts, and they'll think it comes from The Onion. It has to be changed, to save democracy in the USA.

[madrchsod]

1. illinois democrats gerrymander two democratic seats this election cycle

they did two others but they were never going to a democrat this last election cycle. maybe in two years we`ll get one of those.

[Flashmann]

2. maybe in two years we`ll get one of those.

Hopefully one of them will be the seat a smarmy little shitstain of a teabagger by the name of Rodney Davis wormed his way into......

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Great - the first reply looks like "both sides do it"; did you read the Wang article?

You know, the one titled "Gerrymanders, Part 1: Busting the both-sides-do-it myth"?

If Illinois is gerrymandered, then it's a problem too. Wang lists the 'excess Dem seats' from Illinois as 1.7 above what you'd expect. But it's the only Democratic-controlled state in the list of results more than 1 seat out of line; the total, for all similar Republican states, is 13.2.

Pointing to the one case of apparent Democratic gerrymandering is an excellent way to get this corruption ignored. That's what this is: corruption of democracy. It's bad whoever does it; the Republicans do it a lot more, perhaps because they are fundamentally less honest, and less democratic, than the Democrats. Don't just say "maybe we'll pick up an extra seat or 2 when our own gerrymandering kicks in". Two wrongs do not make a right. Don't follow the Republicans into abandoning democracy.

[Bjorn Against]

12. There is nothing wrong with admitting both sides do it, in fact we need to acknowledge that to win

If we are to get a non-partisan redistricting system we need to tackle the issue in a non-partisan manner.

While it is true that Republicans have participated in more widespread gerrymandering than Democrats have, it is also true that Democrats do not have their hands completely clean either. We should not be afraid to admit that because if we try to pretend that all the problems are on one side it makes it more difficult to win public support.

This is one issue in which it works to our benefit to put partisanship aside and make it clear that we want a truly non-partisan redistricting process, if we want to convince the public that we want a non-partisan process we have to tackle this issue in a non-partisan manner. We do not want to make it appear as if we are trying to manipulate the system for partisan purposes, the best way to tackle this is to show the system has already been manipulated for partisan purposes and we want to change it in a non-partisan manner.

This is not going to be an easy battle and in order to win we need to get the backing of independents, and if we are willing to acknowledge gerrymandering from Democrats we may even get some Republican support for non-partisan redistricting reform.

Never forget the challenges we face in reaching our goal, when we are talking about changing the electoral system we need to win over people who are generally not on our side and we are not going to do that if we pretend this is an entirely partisan issue.

[spanone]

4. it should be illegal.

[Thav]

10. Iowa does it differently

An independent commission draws up election maps based on population. Each district should have roughly the same population. The only thing the government can do to this map is vote it up or down - no changes to the lines. If it gets voted down, the commission changes it without government influence. I don't think there has been more than 4 changes to a map.

That seems to work, so every state should adopt it.

[phantom power]

5. I agree, but how do we bell that cat?

Similar to the problem of Citizens United - we badly need to reduce the influence of big money on elections and policy, but now the guys we have to defeat have arranged the rules in their favor. Likewise with gerrymandering.

[theaocp]

7. wolf-pac.com n/t

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. It will take careful arguing; but the Voting Rights Act stopped discriminatory gerrymandering

on the grounds of race, color or membership in a language minority group, so it is possible to make a federal law that stops unfair redistricting by states, and have it acknowledged as constitutional. With Republicans holding the House, you couldn't get a similar federal law passed now, it's true; but it shows the vital importance of controlling state legislatures for when they carry out redistricting, and, if Democrats ever get the House back, it should be a priority to fix it for the whole country.

[Fumesucker]

6. Plenty of things about America are "literally unbelievable" to many foreigners

Like our health care system for instance.

And gun shows for another.

[RandiFan1290]

9. Republicans get to work for the 1% when elected

They don't look to the Dems for deals or grand bargains. They take it.

[obamamyprez]

11. Google "most gerrymandered district"

[davidn3600]

13. Political parties are at the core of the problem

George Washington was right. He said political parties only create division and a cycle of retaliation in a desperate attempt to gain or maintain power.

Gerrymandering is a perfect example of this. And the system itself can never change because of the political parties.

Republicans are doing it more right now because they've gained significant power in the state governments since the 2010 election. But are you telling me that if the Democrats had the opportunity to expand their power and influence in the congress that they wouldn't attempt to get retaliation against Republicans and gerrymander themselves in?

I mean come on....lets be realistic here....

[muriel_volestrangler]

14. Democrats will sometimes do the right thing, at the cost of their own political power

Look what they did in the 1960s under LBJ with voting rights acts, to end Jim Crow in the south, even though that meant they started losing in the region. They went for justice in voting, while the cynical Republicans picked up the pissed-off racist voters who left the Democrats.