elections

Embrace the Gerrymander!

~ ianrandalstrock ~ 2 Comments

The Republican redistricting scheme currently causing so much consternation in and toward Texas gives me hope. Not, perhaps, in the way you might think. But in it, I see the seeds of potentially, maybe, if if if, a solution to the gerrymandering that has plagued this country for two centuries.

Allow me to explain.

I’ve been railing against gerrymandering for years. Gerrymandering is the drawing of boundaries on political districts in order to group blocks of voters together, either to increase the power of one group, or to decrease the power of another. Sometimes it is used to increase the chances that a member of a minority group can win an election. But far more often these days, it is used to cement a political party’s hold on a district, to make it “safe.” (For the problems safe districts cause, see my previous writings.)

In normal times, Congressional district boundaries are redrawn every ten years, after the decennial census data is received, so that the districts accurately represent where the people live and what those people want. These are not normal times.

Governor Abbott of Texas, kowtowing to President Trump’s request, is urging the Texas legislature to redraw the state’s Congressional map right now, half-way through a decennial period, in order to concentrate the Democratic minority voters into fewer districts, and thus give the Republicans, potentially, three to five more seats in the House of Representatives. Democratic members of the Texas legislature have left the state, in order to prevent the legislature from reaching a quorum, which would—at least, in theory— prevent action on the proposal. But they’ve tried such a quorum-break in the past; it has not been successful. I doubt it will be this time, either.

So we have to accept the reality that Texas is about to further marginalize their Democratic population and flip five of their seats in the House to the Republican party.

Governor Newsom of California has been making noises about attempting the same scheme in his state, which would flip several seats from the Republicans to the Democrats. There’ve been whispers elsewhere—such as Governor Hochul in New York—that other states might do something similar if Abbot and Trump get their way in Texas. The problem I foresee is an ongoing character flaw of the Democrats: the party insists that it must be holier than thou, purer than thou, that it will play be the rules even when their opponents have shown absolutely no compunction about violating those rules. While doing so may give them a moral victory, it will inevitably lead to an actual loss. To my mind, in these cases, the Democrats are those crying “life isn’t fair.” No, it isn’t. Everyone should follow the rules. Everyone should be a good, moral, decent human being. Everyone should be more interested in the good of us all than in our individual results.

But not everyone is.

We don’t need Governor Newsom and Governor Hochul warning “don’t do it or we might do something, too.” We need him and his fellow Democratic governors to act! Today! We need them to implement precisely the schemes Abbot and the Texans are planning. We need to gerrymander the country to a fare-thee-well, to legislate out of existence those last 40 competitive seats in the House.

Because then, and only then, will we all see just how egregious the gerrymandering has become. Only then will it be brought to the Supreme Court. And to my mind, regardless of the Court’s political slant, there is no way it can allow such outrageous diminution of the minorities to survive. In such a case, I think, the Supreme Court will only be able to rule that the gerrymandering violates the people’s rights to be fairly represented, and that political maps must be drawn in a fair, impartial manner.

(Yes, I know, I’m an idealist. It may not work out that way. But I don’t see any other way to fix the mess we’re in.)

And if, IF my dream comes true, may I humbly suggest new legislation regarding how districts are drawn? A fairly simple test, actually:

No Congressional district, when drawn on a Mercator projection map, shall be drawn in such a way that a straight line drawn on that map shall be able to cross into the district more than once. That is, except in cases where the state border itself violates this dictum.

I don’t expect any of this to happen. I expect the Democrats will continue to purge their own ranks, as they threw out Al Franken. I expect they’ll yell and whine and do nothing, while Texas rejiggers their Congressional map, and that the election of 2026 will result in a Trumpian increase in the House, and we’ll continue bitching and moaning about their self-serving actions for years to come.

But wouldn’t it be nice if I was wrong, and we could actually make things better?


Democrats flee Texas to block Republican redistricting map backed by Trump


Texas Democrats arrive in Illinois to block vote back home on redrawn House maps sought by Trump


Limited options for Democrats to retaliate if Texas Republicans redraw congressional map

Notes from the inauguration of Donald Trump as the 47th president of the United States

~ ianrandalstrock ~ 1 Comment

Senator Amy Klobuchar’s speech seemed a bit pointed. Wonder how many will catch it. Meanwhile, Donald Trump was looking at the ceiling

Reverend Franklin Graham’s invocation: “enemies”?!

After taking the oath, Trump talking with his children, Vance blends right in, looks just like another Trump son.

Trump’s speech: he can’t seem to stop campaigning. He spends too much time complaining about and insulting the government he will now be leading. Great presidents give inspiring, unifying, visionary speeches. Donald Trump gave a nasty, belittling, self-congratulatory speech. Donald Trump was not, and probably will not, be a great president. Guess he never read Winston Churchill: “In War: Resolution. In Defeat: Defiance. In Victory: Magnanimity. In Peace: Good Will.” There was nothing magnanimous about his speech, and very little good will.

Greatness is not a mantle a person can claim; it is an honor bestowed by others in retrospect.

He mentioned the assassin’s bullet that hit his ear, but there doesn’t seem to be even a scar.

Lines from Trump’s speech that caught my ear:

“The golden age of American begins right now.”

“We will not allow ourselves to be taken advantage of any longer.”

“Our sovereignty will be reclaimed.”

“The scales of justice will be rebalanced.”

“America will soon be greater, stronger, and far more exceptional than ever before.”

“We must be honest about the challenges we face. While they are plentiful, they will be annihilated.”

“My election is a mandate to completely reverse this betrayal.”

“We will begin the great restoration of America.”

“First, I will declare a national emergency at our southern border. All illegal entry will immediately be halted,” and we will begin the process of returning millions of criminals back where they came from.

“I will send troops to the southern border to repel the disastrous invasion of our country.”

“We will also be designating the cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.”

“And by invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, I will direct the government to eliminate the presence of all foreign gangs and criminal networks.”

“As commander-in-chief, I have no higher responsibility than to defend our country from foreign threats and invasions.”

“I will direct all members of my cabinet … to defeat record inflation and rapidly bring down costs and prices. The inflation crisis was caused by massive overspending…”

“I will declare a national energy emergency. We will drill baby drill.”

“America will be a manufacturing nation once again.”

“With my actions today, we will end the green new deal and revoke the electric vehicle mandate.”

“We are establishing the external revenue service to collect all tariffs and duties.”

“My administration will establish the brand new department of government efficiency. After years and years of illegal and unconstitutional federal efforts to restrict free expression. I will sign an order to immediately stop all government censorship and bring back free speech to America.”

“As of today, it will henceforth be the policy of the United States government that there are only two genders: male and female.”

“We didn’t give the Panama Canal to China, we gave it to Panama, and we’re taking it back.”

“We will expand our territory…” manifest destiny…

“…plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars.”

“In America, the impossible is what we do best.”

Trump’s second speech in Emancipation Hall to supporters—longer than his official inaugural speech in the Rotunda, but far more rambling and stream of consciousness:

“The first week, the fake news was hitting him [J.D. Vance] pretty hard.”

“The J6 hostages.”

Complaining about lack of voter identification requirements: “we would have won the state of California.”

Rambling and babbling about building the wall in Texas.

“2020 was a rigged election. It showed how bad they are.” “I got like nine million more votes than any other president.” “We made it too big to rig, but they tried like hell to do it. Around 9:02, they gave up.” Also complaining about polling in the run-up to the 2024 election. “We won all seven swing states. We won the popular vote by millions of votes, which is hard for a Republican.” He’s just been sworn in as president for the second time, for a second term, but he can’t let go of the previous election. He’s obsessed with rewriting the past.

Can New York Vote Republican?

~ ianrandalstrock ~ Leave a comment

A friend asked me how many Republican presidents have carried the electoral votes of New York State. It’s a simple enough question. But I think it may be masking something else. My friend may be wondering if the present is monolithic: that the way things are is the way they have always been, and always will be.

New York is currently overwhelmingly Democratic—so much so that it’s nearly inconceivable that New York would vote Republican for president. In 2004, 58.37% of the vote in New York was for John Kerry, the Democrat (he earned 48.3% of the popular vote nationwide). In 2008, Barack Obama took 62.88% of New York (52.9% nationwide). In 2012, Obama got 63.35% of New York (51.1% nationwide). In 2016, Hilary Clinton took 59.01% of New York (48.2% nationwide). And in 2020, Joe Biden garnered 60.87% of New York (51.3% nationwide).

But reality is not quite so unchanging.

There have been 42 elections with a Republican candidate on the ballot for president (the first was John C. Fremont in 1856). In those elections, New York has voted for the Republican candidate 20 times, and 22 times for the Democrat. When New York votes Republican, that candidate has won 17 times (New York voted for unsuccessful Republicans Fremont in 1856, Hughes in 1916, and Dewey in 1948). When New York votes Democratic, that candidate has won 15 times (New York voted for unsuccessful Democrats Seymour in 1868, Tilden in 1876, Humphrey in 1968, Dukakis in 1988, Gore in 2000, Kerry in 2004, and Hilary Clinton in 2016).

So yes, in the current era, New York state voting Republican is highly unlikely. But such was not always the case. And it may not always be the case in the future. The key take-away from these numbers is: things change. The Republicans may be able to divorce themselves from the insanity of the Trumpian party, and once again field rational candidates for national office. The Democrats may become unhinged through their own acceptance of a radical fringe. The one thing we know for certain is that humans are very good at extrapolating trends, but absolutely terrible and foreseeing inflection points in those trends.

Conflicting job qualifications?

~ ianrandalstrock ~ Leave a comment

There are a bunch of elections running around my mind these days: national, local, clubs and associations, and historic. In many of them (but not the one in which you’re a candidate, so don’t worry, I’m not talking about you), it seems to me the skill set necessary to be a successful candidate is not only completely different from the skill set necessary to be a good office holder, but sometimes completely at odds with it.

Consider, for example, the presidency of the USA. To be a good candidate for the job, one has to be an incredible fund-raiser, be a glad-hander, be photogenic (with an equally photogenic family, or at least a compelling family story), be able to whip up crowds of enthusiasm, and be able to speak in sound bites. And in the modern era, one also has to be a staunch ideologue, in order to whip up the enthusiasm of the extreme members of one’s own political party. But to be a good president, one has to be able to think deeply about important issues, and then make hard decisions about them; to be able to negotiate with people in equally powerful positions from (perhaps) less powerful countries; be able to keep secrets about the biggest issues that would bring in incredible amounts of publicity; be willing to compromise on almost everything in order to accomplish anything; and be able to inspire people to be selfless and to aspire for greatness.

Mind you, the same dichotomy (although on a much smaller scale) seems to obtain for most any office that is elected: mayor, congressman, club official, you name it.

Having grumbled about this state of affairs — which is the same state we’ve been in for a very long time — I can’t see that there’s any better way to choose who we want to elect to office. But I sure wish there was a better way.

One caucus is enough, right?

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We’ve spent nearly a year in this incredibly lengthened election season, started early because Donald Trump tried to forestall his criminal indictments. We still have more than nine months to go before election day. And all along, we’ve heard the politicians and pundits telling us the only thing that matters is the votes on November 5 (plus all the early voting and absentee ballots).

But now, as a dozen Republicans have already decided they have no chance, we’re hearing so many saying Nikki Haley, too, should quit, because she has no chance to beat Trump for the nomination.

Mind you, today is just the first primary (in New Hampshire), and the only voters who’ve already expressed their opinions were the 110,272 who participated in the Iowa caucuses. Those 110,272 represent just 0.07% of the 158 million who cast votes in 2020—that is, a rounding error. They don’t even represent a majority of Iowa voters (1,690,871 voted in 2020). Indeed, they’re only 14.6% of the registered Republicans in the state. We’ve spent a year waiting to see the outcome of the primaries, but just as they’re starting, we’re told the rest of them don’t matter, because one in fourteen Republicans in Iowa (56,243) expressed a preference for Trump.

Major news outlets stopped reporting election results while the polls were still open after 1980, when there was great consternation that doing so might have suppressed the vote in the western states. But now we’re told that we don’t even have to wait for the polls to open in the other 99+% of the country: the few Iowans who cared to join the caucuses are enough. No, just no. I say, let ’em run until the end.

The Election of 2022 Was Against Things and People, Not For Them

~ ianrandalstrock ~ 1 Comment

I’m watching the election returns (and still watching them). One thing I keep hearing is surprise that the predicted “red wave” did not materialize. I think the fact that the pundits expected one is a result of poor polling.

Specifically, I think political polls are too cut-and-dried, too black-or-white, without enough shades of gray. But none of us are so one-dimensional. I answered one phone call this election season which was a poll, and I tried to give them my thoughts. But the poll wasn’t robust enough to properly record them. The first question was “which is the most important issue for you when you’re voting this November.” The problem is, I’m not a one-issue voter, and I’ve a hunch most of us aren’t. But every poll which focused on “the economy/inflation” as the one issue voters would find most important missed the nuances.

Certainly, the economy is one of the issues I considered. But it’s not the only one. I also considered crime, and health care, and national defense, and voters’ rights, and the intrusion of the nanny state, and the environment, and appointments to the federal judiciary, and… well, you get the point. I think about all the ways the government can affect my life (for good or ill), and then I consider the candidates, and I choose those who I think will do the most good and the least bad. Asking me which one issue matters, and then which candidate I’ll vote for to serve that issue, means you’re gathering data that doesn’t reflect reality.

Another failing I saw in this year’s polling was the focus on President Biden’s approval rating, which is indeed quite low. But the polls only considered that, historically, a president with a low approval rating saw the other party win most of the seats in Congress. They didn’t consider that we can think poorly of Joe Biden’s job performance, while at the same time not wanting the Trumpian party candidates to win election and lend any more credence to that grifter.

Unfortunately, that’s the pity of most of our recent elections: very few of us are voting for the candidates; we’re voting against their opponents. I’m going to write directly to both Governor Hochul and Attorney General James, to tell them that my votes for them were not part of any mandate they might consider their elections to be. Rather my votes were against their opponents (well, in the case of James, I do favor certain of her ongoing cases that I fear would have been dropped had her opponent won).

I think that may be the big story no one is telling about the current election cycle: not many of us are truly happy with any of our choices. We’re voting to preserve what we have and improve our lives despite our representatives, not through them.