• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Supreme Court turns away Pennsylvania electoral map dispute

digitusmedius said:
You obviously don't know (or deliberately refuse to) what gerrymandering is.
Click to expand...

Okay Lucy....SPLAIN.

hqdefault.jpg
 
danarhea said:
This is huge, as it allows state courts to outlaw political gerrymanders. The irony here is that this states rights issue, championed by the Conservative SCOTUS, is going to benefit Democrats. LOL.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...+Reuters/PoliticsNews+(Reuters+Politics+News)
Click to expand...

That is what the short run will be. In the long run, it won't benefit either republicans or democrats. It will hopefully benefit the american public, regardless of political affiliation.
 
Gladly:
The primary goals of gerrymandering are to maximize the effect of supporters' votes and to minimize the effect of opponents' votes. A partisan gerrymander's main purpose is to influence not only the districting statute but the entire corpus of legislative decisions enacted in its path.[18]

These can be accomplished through a number of ways:

"Cracking" involves spreading voters of a particular type among many districts in order to deny them a sufficiently large voting bloc in any particular district.[19] Political parties in charge of redrawing district lines may create more "cracked" districts as a means of retaining, and possibly even expanding, their legislative power. By "cracking" districts, a political party would be able to maintain, or gain, legislative control by ensuring that the opposing party's voters are not the majority in specific districts.[20][21] An example would be to split the voters in an urban area among several districts wherein the majority of voters are suburban, on the presumption that the two groups would vote differently, and the suburban voters would be far more likely to get their way in the elections.

"Packing" is to concentrate as many voters of one type into a single electoral district to reduce their influence in other districts.[19][21] In some cases, this may be done to obtain representation for a community of common interest (such as to create a majority-minority district), rather than to dilute that interest over several districts to a point of ineffectiveness (and, when minority groups are involved, to avoid likely lawsuits charging racial discrimination). When the party controlling the districting process has a statewide majority, packing is usually not necessary to attain partisan advantage; the minority party can generally be "cracked" everywhere. Packing is therefore more likely to be used for partisan advantage when the party controlling the districting process has a statewide minority, because by forfeiting a few districts packed with the opposition, cracking can be used in forming the remaining districts.

"Hijacking" redraws two districts in such a way as to force two incumbents to run against each other in one district, ensuring that one of them will be eliminated.[19]

"Kidnapping" moves an incumbent's home address into another district.[19] Reelection can become more difficult when the incumbent no longer resides in the district, or possibly faces reelection from a new district with a new voter base. This is often employed against politicians who represent multiple urban areas, in which larger cities will be removed from the district in order to make the district more rural.
These tactics are typically combined in some form, creating a few "forfeit" seats for packed voters of one type in order to secure more seats and greater representation for voters of another type. This results in candidates of one party (the one responsible for the gerrymandering) winning by small majorities in most of the districts, and another party winning by a large majority in only a few of the districts.
Click to expand...

Here's the source for the above and much more detail if you're really interested: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerrymandering#Gerrymandering_tactics
 
Last edited:
PleasantValley said:
So your idea of a democracy is a society devoid of any and all conservative thinking and those of whom identify as conservative?

In a pure democracy where the popular vote rules everything, then this entire country would be ruled by New York City elites forever.
I for one do not want to have to pay state, county and city taxes.
I don't want to pay $3,000 a month for a 600 square foot apartment.
I also don't want to have to come up with the first and last months rent, PLUS a security deposit to rent a place.
I also might want to have a 32 ounce drink one day.
I also do not want to see grits replaced by bagels for breakfast.
I also like the flavor a little bit of bacon grease imparts in what i cook.

If the New York City elites would have their way this entire country would be one huge nanny state.

This is why our very wise founders established the Electoral College.
So places like New York City would not dictate and rule the rest of the country unending.
Click to expand...

There is no chance a pure democracy will ever exist, any more than mammals that can breathe pure oxygen.
But the only thing that is representative of the democratic process IS the electoral college, which serves ZERO function in a midterm election.
The Electoral College and its electors will not be casting any votes whatsoever in the midterms because they only vote in POTUS elections.

Now it would appear that a court has ruled gerrymandering unconstitutional, and the SCOTUS isn't interested in hearing any more appeals, at least not at this time, thus the lower court ruling stands.
Gerrymandering isn't conservative...it's a form of cheating, or at the very least and most kind, it's a fuzzy new kind of math where 75-25 suddenly equals 51-49.
 
MrWonka said:
I don't see this as a states rights issue at all. The leaders of the state are the ones that want the map to remain gerrymandered. It's the court that is overruling them. Whether it's the state supreme court of the actual supreme court is irrelevant.
Click to expand...

It's a state supreme court which made the ruling, and the feds will not intervene in a state judicial decision unless it is unconstitutional.
 
antiquity said:
I was all for this decision until I saw the last word in your post. So it appears its okay for democrats when they are in power to gerrymander and not Republicans when they are in power? Do I sense a little hypocrisy here.
Click to expand...

Damn, did you ever miss the meaning of this. It's going to benefit the Democrats because the vast majority of districts were gerrymandered for Republicans. Of course, you have Maryland and a couple other states which are gerrymandered for Democrats, but again, the vast majority of districts are gerrymandered for Republicans. Reading is fundamental. And don't try to put words in my mouth. I was making an observation. Show me where I ever said it's good for one side and not for the other.

And yea, my last word was an LOL. Why? Because it is humorous that the party which claims to be for states rights appealed this suit in Federal court. THAT makes it hilarious because it shows that all Republican talk about states rights is nothing more than caca del toro.
 
danarhea said:
I see it in Pennsylvania. Now on to Maryland.
Click to expand...

Don't forget NC. Even my own state, OR, might a gerrymandering problem. The D/R ratio is probably 55/45 but it's had only 1 R out of 5 House seats for quite a few years. I went to a website run by 538 called The Atlas of Redistricting which allows the user to see what gerrymandered districts look like vs competitive ones (based on voter demographics and voting records). Check it out:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/redistricting-maps/maryland/
 
Last edited:
Skeptic Bob said:
SCOTUS is still, and will always, be the least partisan branch of government. Just like politicians who aren’t running for re-election are more inclined to vote their conscience than the party line, Justices appointed for life tend to do the same. Don’t get me wrong, they are still swayed by their ideologies, but partisanship is less a factor.
Click to expand...

Hmmmm... Bush v Gore seems to upend that sort of optimism.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom