I have to say, as a Democrat in Texas, I kind of feel Virginia Republicans' pain. It's arguably much worse in their case. They've seen plenty of wins there and its blue tilt is very recent. Us Texas Democrats haven't seen a statewide win in 30 years. I may feel their pain, but I have no sympathy. The mid-decade redistricting battle was started here by Trump. The Republican professional class is in a strong position to start arguing for non-partisan redistricting in some form. I bet Democrats would be very eager to engage with them. I doubt that will happen, but one can always dream.
I think Virginia has gotten bluer because of Trump. Democrats weren't really so energized to get out the vote before the debacle of 2016 and how negative Trump has been. Normie Republican candidates would not have generated the level of local organization Democrats have today.
That’s exactly what happened. He drove away a whole lot of educated voters who had been Republicans. It’s happened in Texas, too, but not nearly to that degree.
Here, Barbara Comstock, for example, would not have lost her seat in Congress (as a Republican) if it weren't for Trump. She quickly joined the Never Trump coalition and supports voting Democratic across the board in order to get MAGA out.
I get the impression that Texas Republicans were fairly ruthless and powerful before Trump and that issues of guns, immigration, and climate would make Texas more Republican on average. I never thought Beto could win with his strong anti-gun stance. It's a real uphill battle there -- good luck!
I wouldn't be so down. It's been frustrating on the federal level, but Democrats have a whole bunch of state-level offices and Roy Cooper is likely to be the next senator. With enough of a wave in November, maybe, just maybe Democrats will surprise in the state legislature.
Curious about the idea of just expanding the house of representatives so that gerrymandering becomes less effective. That seems like best solution - better representation of constituents, and expansion of the house has more staying power than legislatively mandated fair maps. But I just know the immediate response will be whinging about how we have too many politicians as is.
There is another big benefit to the electorate overall of federal action on this, which is stopping state races from being about federal politics.
As things stand now, you can plausibly say that any election for State Rep/Senator/Governor will impact who is elected to Congress, since they set the boundaries. And making state politics a referendum on federal politics further weakens accountability for those officials.
This was one of the major reasons they brought in the direct election of senators last century, because state races were turning into referendums on Senate appointments. So here's hoping they nip this one in the bud before it keeps spiralling.
Amen. I'm in the odd position of feeling guilty if I make out-of-state political contributions and feeling guilty if I don't. I'm sure I'm not the only one. When I get calls from around the country (and I do - occasionally even from Republicans who are either severely mistaken or overly optimistic (I _am_ a lifetime subscriber to The Dispatch)) we nearly always end up talking about the every local race is national now. And it sucks. Big time.
I get the impression that, particularly before Trump, Virginia had a fairly collegial approach to governing at the state level. There was a lot of effort put into developing its anti-Gerrymander law and gaining public support. Democrats were sad to set it aside temporarily with this latest vote. I haven't looked for polling, but my hypothesis is that this vote was closer than other recent elections in the state at least in part because of Democrats feeling conflicted about it.
Of course, it simply could be that Republicans were very energized by Trump's push to block the temporary Gerrymander, and there was a lot of confusing and deceptive messaging around it from GOP aligned groups.
I believe there are ways to test for Gerrymandered maps objectively. I have a mathematician friend who works for tech companies who told me he had read about a mathematical model that basically "rolls the dice" on proposed maps based on detailed precinct-level voting. It calculates how far the outcomes of the Gerrymandered map are from a perfectly neutral mean of some sort. (I forget what that was based on but it sounded completely logical.) Your idea of a federal law could be realized objectively when there is sufficient political will.
I have to say, as a Democrat in Texas, I kind of feel Virginia Republicans' pain. It's arguably much worse in their case. They've seen plenty of wins there and its blue tilt is very recent. Us Texas Democrats haven't seen a statewide win in 30 years. I may feel their pain, but I have no sympathy. The mid-decade redistricting battle was started here by Trump. The Republican professional class is in a strong position to start arguing for non-partisan redistricting in some form. I bet Democrats would be very eager to engage with them. I doubt that will happen, but one can always dream.
I think Virginia has gotten bluer because of Trump. Democrats weren't really so energized to get out the vote before the debacle of 2016 and how negative Trump has been. Normie Republican candidates would not have generated the level of local organization Democrats have today.
That’s exactly what happened. He drove away a whole lot of educated voters who had been Republicans. It’s happened in Texas, too, but not nearly to that degree.
Here, Barbara Comstock, for example, would not have lost her seat in Congress (as a Republican) if it weren't for Trump. She quickly joined the Never Trump coalition and supports voting Democratic across the board in order to get MAGA out.
I get the impression that Texas Republicans were fairly ruthless and powerful before Trump and that issues of guns, immigration, and climate would make Texas more Republican on average. I never thought Beto could win with his strong anti-gun stance. It's a real uphill battle there -- good luck!
As a North Carolina Democrat, similar feelings.
I wouldn't be so down. It's been frustrating on the federal level, but Democrats have a whole bunch of state-level offices and Roy Cooper is likely to be the next senator. With enough of a wave in November, maybe, just maybe Democrats will surprise in the state legislature.
Since you seem interested I'll plug kenmccool dot com to help de-Cotham the state house.
Curious about the idea of just expanding the house of representatives so that gerrymandering becomes less effective. That seems like best solution - better representation of constituents, and expansion of the house has more staying power than legislatively mandated fair maps. But I just know the immediate response will be whinging about how we have too many politicians as is.
There is another big benefit to the electorate overall of federal action on this, which is stopping state races from being about federal politics.
As things stand now, you can plausibly say that any election for State Rep/Senator/Governor will impact who is elected to Congress, since they set the boundaries. And making state politics a referendum on federal politics further weakens accountability for those officials.
This was one of the major reasons they brought in the direct election of senators last century, because state races were turning into referendums on Senate appointments. So here's hoping they nip this one in the bud before it keeps spiralling.
Amen. I'm in the odd position of feeling guilty if I make out-of-state political contributions and feeling guilty if I don't. I'm sure I'm not the only one. When I get calls from around the country (and I do - occasionally even from Republicans who are either severely mistaken or overly optimistic (I _am_ a lifetime subscriber to The Dispatch)) we nearly always end up talking about the every local race is national now. And it sucks. Big time.
I get the impression that, particularly before Trump, Virginia had a fairly collegial approach to governing at the state level. There was a lot of effort put into developing its anti-Gerrymander law and gaining public support. Democrats were sad to set it aside temporarily with this latest vote. I haven't looked for polling, but my hypothesis is that this vote was closer than other recent elections in the state at least in part because of Democrats feeling conflicted about it.
Of course, it simply could be that Republicans were very energized by Trump's push to block the temporary Gerrymander, and there was a lot of confusing and deceptive messaging around it from GOP aligned groups.
I believe there are ways to test for Gerrymandered maps objectively. I have a mathematician friend who works for tech companies who told me he had read about a mathematical model that basically "rolls the dice" on proposed maps based on detailed precinct-level voting. It calculates how far the outcomes of the Gerrymandered map are from a perfectly neutral mean of some sort. (I forget what that was based on but it sounded completely logical.) Your idea of a federal law could be realized objectively when there is sufficient political will.