Well, battle plans are being drawn, anyway. Please forgive the Politico link:
As Democrats aim to capitalize on this year’s Republican turmoil and start building back their own decimated bench, former Attorney General Eric Holder will chair a new umbrella group focused on redistricting reform—with the aim of taking on the gerrymandering that’s left the party behind in statehouses and made winning a House majority far more difficult.
The new group, called the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, was developed in close consultation with the White House. President Barack Obama himself has now identified the group—which will coordinate campaign strategy, direct fundraising, organize ballot initiatives and put together legal challenges to state redistricting maps—as the main focus of his political activity once he leaves office.
It’s hard to overestimate just how B a FD this could be if PBO and AG Holder put their considerable talents and influence behind it — and get the rest of us onboard, as a good community organizer will surely do. I know several of you have joined me in hoping that President Obama would choose something huge and truly change-making to focus on when he leaves the White House as a relatively young man with enormous popularity.
I was thinking voting rights, which could certainly fall under the purview of the initiative described above. What are these feels I’m feeling? Could it be…hope?
Mothra
Yes we can!
MattF
It’s great. And notable, since former Presidents usually go into an apolitical limbo.
JPL
OT Michelle is going to campaign in AZ! Suzanne saw Trump, maybe she can snag some tickets to see the real deal.
Obama is going up against the Koch brothers. It doesn’t seem like a fair fight.
Beth in VA
I’m psyched. Love this political Obama.
NobodySpecial
@JPL: It’s not fair. He could literally dance on their graves, were he so inclined.
p.a.
“Democracy isn’t voting. Democracy is counting votes.” Not when one party is working from the fascist playbook. Access + teh maths both matter. Cheating is their only hope given demographics (“demography is destiny”), but am I wrong to think the Rethugs were emboldened further by the Dems’ rollover in 2000? They staged a riot to fix the Florida theft, and the Dem squishes let it slide ‘for the good of the country’. GWB, Cheney, Ashcroft, 9/11, Iraq, al Ghraibfor the good of the country.
Bitter, me? Why yes, I guess I am.
Major Major Major Major
I saw that. This is excellent news.
@NobodySpecial: once they lose the 2020 battle they’ll be dead before they’re relevant again, so…
Iowa Old Lady
This would make such a huge difference not only in our ability to elect Democrats, but possibly also in the votes of Republican members of congress. Right now, their only contest is in the primary so they steer hard right. They’d be less able and maybe less inclined to do that.
geg6
I can’t think of anything that would have a more powerful effect on the nation than to take on the gerrymandering. It is the one ingredient that sours all else that might be going well in both national and state politics. I’ve been a little involved with a statewide organization here in PA called Fair Districts PA, a group sponsored by the League of Women Voters and Common Cause. They want an independent commission to do any future redistricting. I’m on board with that.
Iowa Old Lady
@p.a.: I watched the movie “Recount” on Amazon Prime. I don’t know how accurate it was, but it was infuriating.
geg6
@Iowa Old Lady:
Based on what I read of it and saw on the screen and what I remember at the time and in reports during and after, it was pretty much right on (with the usual cautions that, of course, some events and people are changed slightly for brevity and to consolidate such a large cast of characters that is usual for any tv or movie adaptations of real events).
Booger
y u no “Chief Justice Barack Hussein Obama?”
JDM
We need this. And a strong revival of the 50 state strategy.
Hal
One of the things irritating me about this political season are the number of posts on Facebook I see from a handful of friends and friends of friends complaining about how crappy this election is, because both candidates suck and politics sucks. It’s all an illusion, there is no freedom! I’m pretty sure that these are people who do not vote in any election, but instead of saying that, they have to get their 2 cents in to make sure everyone knows they’ve figured it out and everyone else are sheep. Really, if you don’t vote, then just STFU. I don’t watch football, so why would I have an opinion on who should go to the Super Bowl? Terrible analogy, but it’s all I got this morning.
Shrillhouse
Typical ACORNistas!
Back to their old tricks, I see.
Major Major Major Major
@Hal: I think that happens every election but it’s just extra galling this time around. That’s the case for me, at least.
Jim
Totally agree. I live in the purple state of Virginia. State-wide elections, where everyone gets an equal vote, go to Democrats (Gov, LGov, AG, Senators). District elections, gerrymandered by the Repubs, favor Repubs, so we have a Republican state senate and assembly. This needs to change.
The Other Bob
Once again Democrats might also save the Republicans from themselves.
hitchhiker
It’s one of those even-a-braindead-person-could-understand-this kind of things. Districts should be drawn by impartial groups so that representation is as close as possible to the people’s wishes.
This isn’t about getting a D house (tho’ that would happen). It’s about bringing the whole process into proximity to the voters. The system is rigged because of money, yes, but we can’t do anything about that until we get representatives who respond to the people.
This is such good news.
SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch
Betty, nice title riff on Adam’s post last night. Well done!
scav
@Hal: FB and most of the internet where people are opining on every single thing they eat and the curtain quality at low-budget hotels constantly? We’re drowning in meaningly 2-cents. As in, this.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
This is huge–or should I say, yuge. No, really, it’s tremendous. Believe me! If this works, it’ll be amazing how tremendous this will be. We Democrats have been such total losers about this, believe me. Really low energy. Sad.
In all seriousness, though, I can’t say enough good about this. One thing I’ll hand to Republicans: They’re committed to winning–all the way down to the shitty little local offices, town and city and township councils, county supervisor boards, school boards and county party offices. That’s where this unending stream of shitbags springs from. The worst and most ambitious and most (comparatively) competent of them slowly work their way upstream, and end up in state legislatures and Congress. We don’t have any kind of comparable pipeline of promising people on our side, as far as I can see. This could well put us back in the game.
Keith G
Yippee and Yay!!
My largest concern about Obama was that he seemed less interested to the efforts to increase a partisan advantage through party building and related activities. The ideas he believes in are just ideas until there exists a partisan infrastructure to fight and win and hold these goals. One of the biggest reasons that I entertained good thoughts about a future President Hillary Clinton, is that such activities seem to be part of her nature.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Shrillhouse:
lolwut
Jeffro
@hitchhiker:
That would be good…compact districts, drawn automatically by computer, would be even better. No humans messing around, no arguments, just plain old normal looking districts (and surely more moderate than the ones we have, too).
The Moar You Know
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Preach it. They’ve dumped over a million into my local school board race – officially. More off the books of course. Almost that much into our city council races. Amount put in by the Dem party: $0.
The current crop of GOP city council members in jumping to county board of Supes, which this year will go 100% GOP. They can do some damage there.
p.a.
@Jeffro: +1
bowtiejack
First an end to the gerrymandering.
Then public financing of elections.
The popularity of public financing with “conservatives” might surprise a lot of people.
However, Senators and Congressmen of all stripes really HATE the constant grovelling for money that is necessary to stay in office. Like gay marriage this might happen sooner than people think.
hovercraft
@JPL:
And TPM says Hillary is putting $ 2 million into AZ. Yay!
p.a.
I’m not at all ‘in the weeds’ so I’m sure others, esp. commenter Kay from an Ohio perspective, can correct my impression that the Dems focus the resources of their Big Money Boyz on the national party and Pres, Senate, and House races, while Rethugs (whether their Big Money Boyz know or care) feed more down into state and local races as well as the Washington stuff.
joel hanes
@Jeffro:
compact districts, drawn automatically by computer
John Wesley Powell, explorer of the Grand Canyon, proposed that political boundaries should be drawn at the heights of land that separate drainage basins. All the land drained by one creek, or one river, or these three tributaries, etc. This made so much sense that it was completely ignored, and is still completely ignored. Instead we have square states, square counties, KC MO and KC KS in separate states.
oldster
It’s brilliant. I was just arguing with my brother the other day about what BHO should do post-WH. Bro said he should join the SCOTUS; I said he had already declined.
This is, if anything could be, even more important than the SCOTUS. Once Hillary gets 2 or 3 new picks on there, it will be solid for a decade or more. Then we just need to reverse the damage that has been done by the Republicans working from the bottom up–the statehouses, the schoolboards, ALEC, and gerrymandering.
He’s a smart dude, that president of ours.
hovercraft
@Iowa Old Lady:
I think that’s the biggest thing, if congresscritters had to appeal to districts that look more like America, and less like the most rabid part of your base, they would be more inclined to behave responsibly, if for no other reason that their jobs depend on it.
Immanentize
This is great news. They could start with a project to enshrine the right to vote. There isn’t one now, there is only a right not to be denied the right if one exists. This would shift the burden so completely in voting limitation cases.
They could also work on changing the number of people in a congressional district. It currently stands at roughly 710,000 people, but Wyoming and Vermont have fewer than 600,000 representatives making their populations over-represented by more than 10% (a magic number in under representation cases).* If the number went to the number of the lowest population state number, big urban states would gain more representatives and more congressional power.
*Meanwhile, Montana has something like 1.2 million people, but only one rep. too. So they are represented at 50% of Wyoming their neighbor.
PIGL
May I just say “Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong”?
Major Major Major Major
@joel hanes: Interestingly, a computer would never ever draw a district like that because the circumference:area ratio would be all wrong.
Jeffro
@hovercraft:
Yay indeed! I thought they might go for AZ over GA. Time to fire up the howitzers, Hillz! (Or better yet, just go the full Palpatine on these sorry sons of guns and show them the full firepower of this fully armed and operational campaign!!)
Hungry Joe
I’d like to see Congressional districts disposed of altogether. In each state a party would run a slate of candidates; if the state has 18 Congresscritters, there’d be 18 candidates from each party, numbered 1-18. You vote for party only, not individual candidates (although it’d be obvious who the leaders are: They’re the ones at the top of the ticket). If your party gets 33% of the vote, it sends the top six (33% of 18) reps to Washington. Each party would surely take pains to distribute their candidates over a wide geographical area — especially those near the top of the ticket, with the best chance of getting in — in order to get votes from all over the state. This would also allow a voice for smaller parties: If your state has 15 seats in Congress and the small party gets 7% of the vote, it’d send one representative to Washington. Combined with, say, 21 other members of that party from other states, this new voice could exercise considerable influence as swing votes.
It’d still be our system, but with some of the better aspects of parliamentary democracy thrown in. And gerrymandering would be obsolete.
gene108
@p.a.:
Republicans have more big money boys. They can spend their money on more races.
scav
@Jeffro: Not quite that simple. There’s still the coding and the choice of measures, techniques, etc which can be tricky and introduce bias and other issues. Having observed the fallout from some automatically generated census divisions in the 2000 census, things can get seriously wacked out. For the measures, compactness isn’t the sole criteria, there are also natural and legal boundaries to juggle, there are different measures for demographic balancing and there may not be a single solution in anycase. People and thus potential prejudices are going to necessarily intervene. Computer-generated solutions will be a part, but the rest of the surrounding infrastructure needs attention and can’t be written out.
ETA: As for watersheds, rivers seemed natural at one time too, but they move (there are some interesting bits along the Missisippi), granted, rivers move faster than the edges of watersheds. Easy boundary solutions are not thick on the ground.
hovercraft
@Booger:
He has said that it would be much to isolating a life for him, and he would be bored. Both Obama’s have said they want to get back into normal society, where they can do and say whatever they like. As evidenced by RBG stepping in it last week, as a justice on the court your every word is subject to scrutiny. I know ex-presidents words are also subject to comment, but they are private citizens expressing their views, which is their right.
Jeffro
@joel hanes:
Yup, it’s dumb. But let’s save dissolving the 50 states into 20 regions or whatever for another day. =)
NR
New CNN polls:
North Carolina: Clinton +1
Nevada: Clinton +2
Ohio: Trump +4
Betty Cracker
And another thing: I’m one of those intemperate folks who understands why PBO and admin figures like Holder can’t lash out at goons like Louie Gohmert but longs to see it anyway. What better revenge than to redistrict swine like Gohmert of TX, Yoho of FL, King of IA, et al, out of a job, or at least reduce their numbers and make the ones who do hang onto their seats have to moderate their tone or face electoral oblivion? A cold buffet served up by two far-thinking men.
Betty Cracker
@NR: Doom! Woe!
Jeffro
@scav:
Um…the article and other like it just use Census data, sorts for compactness, and there you go. Can’t get much more wacked-out than NC 1 and 12. Go with compactness and you don’t have to worry about natural boundaries; compactly-drawn districts would be the legal boundaries; and there’s no demographic balancing – as that can be argued eight gazillion different ways.
Screw it, turn it over to the computers and people & their prejudices (except those against computers, lol) get written right out of the equation.
WereBear
OMGosh! So excited!
This is a more than worthy cause.
fastEddie
here in Blue Illinois there is an initiative to have “fair maps” – but unless the red state get it also it is just unilateral disarmament. If all states are fairly mapped, the republican will lose badly.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@The Other Bob:
Yes, it would be nice for the gerrymandering to end before the demographics swing it so the Democrats don’t need to care and we end up with a perminate Democrat majority with nothing to keep them honest.
hovercraft
@Jeffro:
Robby Mook says that they are expanding to down ballot races in Indiana and Missouri.
Shell
Its a conspiracy!
Mai.naem.mobile
@NR: Sorry Kay but fuck Ohio. For all the money that went into Ohio through the Auto Bailout and this is the reward the Dems get.
scav
@Jeffro: And cities don’t slop over across watershed boundaries? At a certain scale, sure, top of the Sierras not a lot of spreading cities slopping across both sides of that, but at the scale of the more local areas we’re going to need to administer certain things? It’s just a different type of artificially imposed lines on the distribution of people across space (which is following different rules).
Patricia Kayden
@p.a.: No you’re 100% right. What happened in 2000 was a travesty and an injustice to the majority of voters who didn’t vote for Bush and Democrats definitely rolled over too easily. Thankfully, Trump is doing his best to be so odious that we shouldn’t have a close election this time around (God willing).
JMG
@Mai.naem.mobile: Relax. In a state where an election is close, some polls are going to show candidate A in the lead, others candidate B.
hovercraft
I think that the weak puzzy Obama’s message to Trump Buddy Putin is beginning to go out.
From TPM
EDIT: Between this and Assange suddenly losing internet access, the evil empire is up to something. Or maybe it’s just a big coinkydink.
cmorenc
@Major Major Major Major:
Even if the Rs lose badly in 2016 (Presidency, Senate, and much narrower margin in the House) – they will likely use their likely-retained dominance of too many state houses to construct as strong a bunker as possible against losing control. And had they won the Presidency in 2016 and kept the Senate and House, their agenda would have been threefold: even more boldly gerrymandering the electorate itself, via even more restrictive requirements designed to cage potential dem-leaning demographics out of effective voting eligibility, constructing much more formidable and durable electoral advantages than they have gerrymandered into present districting, and destroying every progressive accomplishment since the new deal (via legislation + hard-right SCOTUS appointments, executive orders, etc) in such a way that they couldn’t feasibly be revived for decades.
IN SHORT, they may be demographically doomed, but they’re like a wounded animal thrashing about and will still be VERY dangerous and devious over the next four years, and they still control enough space to keep progressives uncomfortably cramped for several more years in terms of what can actually be done.
scav
@Jeffro: Funny, but I guess my career spent largely in doing something equivalent, with colleagues studying exactly those and related issues (racial equality in school districting, systematic error in geographic measures of racial disparity, etc), has been utterly useless. Guess I went to the bleeding conferences for nothing. Glad it’s cleared up.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@NR:
Do you really think Clinton would be spending time and money in AZ and Texas if their internal polling showed anything like that? CNN has a Trump house effect. Their polls are garbage.
Patricia Kayden
@gene108: Yet, Democrats donated money to a GOFUNDME account to reopen that NC GOP office which Repubs probably fire bombed themselves to make Democrats look bad. Sigh.
Elizabelle
I’m glad to see this. I don’t like to see gerrymandering by EITHER party.
California seems to be showing us the way. Nationwide, perhaps we would be better served by elections between the two top-vote getters, regardless of party. It could introduce much needed moderation into our politics.
Great topic!! And an outlet for energy and work after the election.
Next up: unconglomerating the major media, if that’s even possible.
NBC has been so effing toxic this election, it’s not by accident or even funny. Yes, they are the home and paycheck-provider to the Morning Joke crew. That’s not an accident.
Gravenstone
Intelligence and ambition, absolutely. But what do you think the response from the Republicans will be to having two very high profile African-American individuals spearheading this initiative? They won’t be content with doubling down on the attempted disenfranchisement, they’ll intensify their efforts by an order of magnitude, minimum. This will be their worst nightmares given flesh. Let us savor.
/Noonan
Patricia Kayden
@NR:
The polls are all over the place when it comes to Ohio. I see one that shows Secretary Clinton up by 8 points. Not sure why you picked one that shows Trump up by 4 when there are multiple polls.
Major Major Major Major
@cmorenc: Fine, I’ll take my optimism elsewhere! :P
ETA: @Patricia Kayden: Can we not do the ‘it was a false flag!’ thing?
Patricia Kayden
@Booger: President Obama is young. He can work on this gerrymandering project first and then serve as a Justice on SCOTUS later on. He’ll keep Repub heads spinning for decades to come.
gene108
@Enhanced Voting Techinques:
I think some put too much faith in demographic changes.
It’s not happening the same throughout the country.
Some states will still be rural and overwhelmingly white, with kids raised by conservative parents, who may inherit their parents’ political views.
And Idaho, Utah and Wyoming still get 2 Senators each, just like CA, NY, etc.
Patricia Kayden
@Major Major Major Major: So you believe that a Democratic voter fire bombed the NC GOP office? What evidence do you have? I’m just saying that we don’t know who did it and I don’t see why Democrats felt the need to donate to its rebuilding. And yes, I do believe that a Republican could have damaged that office to make Democrats look bad. This wouldn’t be the first time.
Jeffro
@Gravenstone:
I guess with Obama and Holder working on this, the Right will have a fit…if someone else spearheads it, the Right will just say Obama and Holder are pulling those folks’ strings and still have a fit…so maybe making decisions based on how the Right will react is a futile endeavor?
My guess is, it’ll be something supported by a big majority of Ds, a majority of Is, and a decent share of Rs, meaning majorities in most places.
And in the end, a) I applaud O&H’s big-picture strategy here, and b) it’s better than doing nothing
Schlemazel
@Patricia Kayden:
Oh I think we all pretty much know why that one poll was chosen
low-tech cyclist
@Jim:
Part of it is also the fact that Virginia has its elections for state legislature in odd-numbered years.
You know how the electorate that shows up for midterm elections is usually more Republican than the Presidential electorate? Elections on the off-off-year intensifies that phenomenon considerably. The people who pick the state legislature are the people who vote every damn year, which most people don’t.
JMG
Arguing over polls is dumb. Each poll shows what it shows. Every poll is a rough indicator of a race, not a precise one. I remember back in 2004, which was one hell of a lot closer than this one is now, Democrats seizing on every Ohio and Florida poll showing Kerry in the lead and running with them online for hours. Doing it in reverse is equally silly.
Bill E Pilgrim
Wall Street Is Starting to Talk About a Big Democratic Sweep in November.
Just talking about it. They don’t think it’s going to happen for sure, but now having to think about what they do if it does.
Bostondreams
@Jeffro:
That, um, did NOT end well, alas. Perhaps more going all Sidious on Naboo. “Wipe them out. All of them.”
Keith G
@Mai.naem.mobile: Don’t go all emo and begin fucking Ohio just yet. Other polls show the Buckeye State still in the “likely Clinton” column and Sam Wang still shows Hillary ahead there as of 11:48 this morning. Take. A. Breath.
Jeffro
@gene108:
For now.
You must not have seen my 43-point plan for undoing gridlock, which starts with 15 different impossible-to-ratify constitutional amendments (LOL)
Seriously though, we’d be vastly better off without the Senate, or at least reducing it to some of its non-legislative duties. Another ‘unicorn’ to chase some other day, though
joel hanes
@Major Major Major Major:
circumference:area ratio would be all wrong
Not all that wrong, IMHO (and speaking without evidence)
Drainage basins tend to be roughly blunt cones, or irregular ovals.
Jeffro
@low-tech cyclist:
I wonder if this Obama/Holder initiative will cover things like that – trying to get states to move election years/days to consistent, every-2 or every-4-years, aligned with Presidential & Congressional elections? I know Rs will howl but let them try to make the case that it makes sense as anything BUT diminishing turnout.
Betty Cracker
@Schlemazel: Yep. NR jumps on bad Clinton polls almost as fast as Trump does.
Jacel
This is great news. But first focus resources on strengthening Democratic positions in the 2018 election. Can we finally solve the problem of poor Democratic turnout in non-Presidential years? Unless we sustain some gains in every statehouse and governorship, the redistricting action will still be largely under Republican control in the next decade.
I’ve joked before that Obama should have actively campaigned for the presidency in 2010 and 2014. That might have tricked more Democratically-inclined voters to show up in those years, as well as 2008 and 2012. Perhaps Obama could pretend to be running for president again in the 2018 election.
sukabi
@hitchhiker: yes, impartial groups should draw the district maps, as well as moderate and host any and all debates.
It should be a no brainer that the voting PROCESSES should be handled by impartial groups, not aligned with any party…
Iowa Old Lady
@Jeffro: Iowa redistricts with a non-partisan board that has to follow certain rules such as following county lines. They’re not allowed to consider a ton of things including the home address of a member of congress.
I grant that’s easier to do when you have only 4 districts.
gene108
@Patricia Kayden:
It was a nice thing to do to help some folks out, who got their building burned down. I have no complaints about it.
Second, guys like Mellon-Scaife, the Koch brothers, Pete Peterson, etc. are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to keep their thumbs on the scales, so we enact policies to favor them. Each state has their share of mutli-multi-millionaires, who want to do the same with state level policies.
There are no ideologically driven liberal billionaires, who want to usher in a liberal revolution, unlike those listed above, who most definitely want to usher in a conservative revolution.
I personally do not think there are any liberal billionaires. Period.
Some are realists, and see that things like Global Warming, or income inequality are not sustainable and will impact them or their children and grandchildren in the long wrong, but they do not have an ideological ax to grind. They are not going to invest in think tanks, newspapers, magazines, etc. to try and influence public policy.
This is why the Democrats, in the post-CU world, are at such a big money disadvantage.
It’s not a coincidence, in my opinion, that the Republican dominance in lower level elections coincides with the Citizen’s United ruling, and the gutting of the VRA.
waysel
@Patricia Kayden: I agree with you on both counts. Fire bombing just ain’t Democrats style, whereas Rs are the party of sedition, brute force, and the NRA. And I would much rather see $13000 go to D candidates in NC. We are, sadly, the party of chumps. Charlie Brown, Lucy, and the football one more time. We gotta stop trying to play nice with these amoral assholes.
Jeffro
@Bostondreams:
Good point…let’s just keep the line and forget about how it all shook out.
WereBear
@Hal: I regard such people as wanting deniability. “Don’t blame me, I didn’t vote for them!”
Oh, I do blame you. I really really do.
low-tech cyclist
@scav:
As far as natural boundaries are concerned, simply measure compactness in terms of travel time, rather than linear distance, from the center of population (also measured in terms of travel time) of each district. And the single solution would be the one that minimizes the sum of squares of the distances (again, in terms of travel time) from the centers of population of each district.
Nothing to it, really.
janeform
This is great news. We’re trying to build local party infrastructure with part-time volunteers, many with full-time jobs. It would be awesome to have $$ and a paid staff person to help. Don’t have data, but I think Repugs have the advantage because they have more money and time.
Keith G
@Patricia Kayden: We don’t know. Maybe it WAS someone who was angry at the rise of Trump. Maybe it was someone angry at the anti queer rhetoric of the NC GOP. Maybe it was a personal response to something said/done by folks from that office. It could have been a wiccan or radical vegan (where was Hillary Reddig that night?). And, of course a false flag effort is possible, although it seems to me that those claims occur at a higher rate than actual evidence shows that it is a thing.
I am glad that Democrats stepped in with aid as a sign that we are in this together even if there is an unfortunate number who want to treat this as war.
bluefish
I’d like to see Michelle use her considerable oratory skills, Rolodex, and overall energy to get into the gnarly the matters of gun control and mental health issues–and how they intersect. And the prospect of Barrack Obama, freed up and ready to go, after what I hope is a good, long rest, fills me with glee. Voting rights would be great. So would reform of our educational system K-12. Far too many millions of poorly educated men and women in this country. As we see now every bleeping day.
Bess
Barack and Michelle have (well deserved) celebrity status that they can use to improve the world. If either joined the Court then both would be muted.
They have the public service attitude of Jimmy Carter but with a lot more power to move things forward.
chopper
@NR:
SHOCK POLL! is hilz done for?
Elizabelle
@Patricia Kayden: I’m volunteering in North Carolina; the firebombing was two counties over, and I never heard a word about it until last night after dark, on checking the NY Times website.
No one mentioned it at the doors I knocked, nor did the Democratic campaign staff.
My first thought: I bet they did it themselves. [As in, someone in the GOP or a Trump sympathizer. All the butthurt has been from GOP politicians, making hay with it.]
Plus: the GOP office was closed at 3:30 on Saturday, less than a month before the election? Find that interesting.
Betty Cracker
Monmouth U poll:
Clinton 50
Trump 38
chopper
@shomi:
oh STFU, pantswetter. christ.
Mnemosyne
I didn’t read the whole thread so I’m sure someone else beat me to this, but have you seen the early voting ad with President Obama? It’s HILARIOUS! Watch for the friendly gibe at Bill C’s notorious tardiness.
low-tech cyclist
@Jeffro: There’s no way Virginia will change due to outside pressure. Na ga ha pen. I grew up there, and lived a good deal of my adult life in the Commonwealth too. It’ll only happen if Virginians themselves decide they’re tired of electing their delegates and state senators on a different timetable from everyone else, and even then that pot will have to boil for quite some time before it happens.
Major Major Major Major
@joel hanes: you may well be right. I was thinking water in general. A lot of the districts flagged by computers are just places by lakes/rivers/highways (in CO at least highways tend to follow old river beds).
Peale
@gene108: Yep. And white people start with a big lead in terms of turnout. We can’t exactly wait for demographic change and then hope when it finally comes that people growing up surrounded by Republicans and “disengaged” young people somehow become Democrats. And people who’s parents didn’t vote (because they weren’t citizens) will become regularly voting citizens. It took how many generations after the civil rights movement for the participation rate of African Americans to start to match those of white people? 2. It will take another 12 years for millenials to grow up and maybe start participating in every election because that’s what adults do. But its not necessary for adulthood = civic voting duty to necessarily sink in.
The Dems have been fortunate that Republicans have done things and elected a candidate who will drive more Latinos towards the Democratic party line. But it looks like there actually hasn’t been a huge surge voter registration greater than 4 years ago that would move eligible Latino voters into the committed voter column. And Hispanic millenials seems to have drunk the “no difference” Kool aid just as much as the rest of their co-hort. If that’s the case, we can’t really rely on the Hispanic vote saving Democrats in the mid-terms – 1/2 of Hispanic voters are millenials.
It is very possilble that Hispanic turnout levels will be the same or even lower than 4 years ago. 77% of registered voters saying that they will definitely vote in 2012 vs. 69% in 2016. The numbers might be a wash. That’s not the direction Dems would like. They need hispanic millenials to behave differently than their co-hort, not the same.
gwangung
@chopper: Folks tend to forget, that, AT BEST, one poll out of 20 is going to be an outlier and totally misrepresents what’s going on out there in reality.It’s inherent in the numbers and methodology we’re using
As always, you get a better feel from the aggregation of polls….
StringOnAStick
My brother in law died yesterday, just before I got here; thankfully his brother/my husband was here to comfort his wife, now widow. Watching her deal with all the firsts is heartbreaking; first night without caring for him as he worsened, first morning without him, first decisions made without him.
Life leaves scars on us all and hopefully someday good memories heal them.
raven
Here’s a nice write-up and some pics of the doggie parade!
Betty Cracker
@chopper: Those Dockers ain’t gonna dampen themselves!
Betty Cracker
@StringOnAStick: So sorry to hear that. Wishing strength and courage to you all.
Honus
@Jim: plus Obama carried the state twice, the first democrat win Virginia since LBJ in 1964.
Immanentize
@Keith G: I agree, it really could be anyone and we should include drunk college students as this office was within easy driving distance of any frat house at Chapel Hill….
Elizabelle
@StringOnAStick: Sorry to hear that. Condolences. Glad everyone got to spend time with your BIL in the weeks before his leaving you.
Miss Bianca
@p.a.: We Won’t Get Fooled Again!
Immanentize
@raven: Raven, that is just so fabulous — so joyful! I love the dogasaurus although princess pup was pretty great as well…. Thanks for the reminder that life is not all misery.
sukabi
@waysel: I see the effort by dems to raise funds to rebuild the office as disabling move to the drUmpf campaign… kind of hard to make the claim that a bunch of lunatic ds were behind the vandalism if they’ve immediately condemned and raised money to rebuild.
Counter measures as opposed to measuring counters.
Elizabelle
@raven: Wow. I love the dog that was painted to look like a leopard.
They all look good. Beautiful day for the parade.
Where are pics of the ravenpets? We expect to see some, you know. Whoever took the photos.
Major Major Major Major
@Patricia Kayden: I’d guess anarchists. As for the donations, being a good neighbor is always the right thing to do. The money should have gone elsewhere I guess but it was given voluntarily.
Mnemosyne
@StringOnAStick:
I’m so sorry. We had to deal with my brother’s early death from lung cancer last year and it was hard on everyone. Hopefully your family will be able to pull together and support each other as my family did.
trollhattan
Sam Wang:
And the NYT “Who will be president?” thingie has her odds at 90%, matching the previous apogee from last summer.
NonyNony
@Patricia Kayden: As always, ignore the individual polls and look at the averages. The trend in Ohio was Trump winning, but never getting over 44%. Now it’s too close to call – and Trump still can’t get over 44%. Meanwhile Clinton in the averages has managed periods over that 44% mark.
With Ohio turnout will be key. If Clinton voters don’t show up, Trump will win. If Clinton voters show up, Trump will lose. It’s pretty much that simple. I suspect that the Ohio Democratic Party and the Clinton team know that as well and are focusing their efforts accordingly. Still, make sure if you know any marginal voters in Ohio who don’t always vote you put a bit of pressure on them to consider how bad it looks to have Trump win in Ohio as states like Georgia and Arizona are rejecting him.
Fair Economist
@Patricia Kayden:
It’s great PR, if nothing else. It totally sabotages the violence bothsiderism we’d be hearing for DAYS from the media otherwise, for a mere $13,000. And it’s a good statement on where the Democratic party stands on any kind of political violence.
Major Major Major Major
@trollhattan: are you sure? I heard in the last two threads that we’re doomed.
gvg
@gene108: Actually the Republicans had statehouses and gerrymandering well before Citizens United and that court case has NOT had the effect of helping republicans nationally. It turns out that various kinds of rich people with no personal political experience are gullible and cranks who waste a lot of money backing unelectable brats. Their money disguises from them that not enough voters actually agree with enough of their hobby horses to win except in smaller uncompetative elections. It also turns out that the Democrats have their own rich people if not quite as big and they have a lot more small and middle donors.
Gerrymandering made voters angry over a century ago according to my long ago school days. I hate the concept however I think htere are actually some laws connected to the voting rights act which promote minority gerrymandering to create minority representation. I don’t know the details but if anyone here does can they spell it out…how will the laws support for minority districts interfere with anti gerrymander efforts.
chopper
@shomi:
sometimes imitation is just someone making fun of a dumb schmuck.
tip: you’re the schmuck.
ChrisGrrr
@StringOnAStick: I am sorry – the complete readjustment to life without someone “key” is one of the biggest deals we live through.
Shell
@raven: @raven: With all those tongues hanging out it looked like it was a warm day in Georgia. ;-)
trollhattan
@Major Major Major Major:
To their (the Depends-soilers) defense, there’s a non-zero chance Killary will peel off her fake skin and reveal Kodos during the next debate. Breath held ’til Thursday. There’s a literal zero chance unshackled Donald will reveal himself to be a normal human during the same debate.
chopper
@trollhattan:
i’d vote for that.
Peale
So shouldn’t Druge and O’Keefe have released their bombshell that will destroy Hillary forever by now? They promised that it would be out today.
Mnemosyne
LOS ANGELES COUNTY VOTERS!
I just found out that LA County will have *FIVE* additional early voting locations this year for the two weekends before the election. Go to LAVote.net and click on “Early Voting” for more details.
Matt McIrvin
@Patricia Kayden: The Clinton +8 one is a national poll, not an Ohio poll. But RCP’s average for Ohio is Clinton +0.2; the CNN Trump +4 looks like an outlier until corroborated by other polls. NR is cherry-picking the gloomiest-looking noise available.
Gin & Tonic
@shomi: Hey, moron, redistricting happens every 10 years, after the census.
Jeffro
@low-tech cyclist: well I grew up in Virginia and I’m living here currently, and I agree with you, but I don’t think that’s a uniquely Virginia phenomenon. What the Obama/Holder group can do is come up with several ways to address the issue and then each state can decide what works for it.
NonyNony
@shomi: You know how people call you an idiot. This comment is you being an idiot.
The Democrats do it too because to unilaterally disarm is stupid. You don’t give your opposition an advantage in a fight by just saying “well, I’m not going to use a knife even if you do”.
As to why they didn’t do it in 2008 – Obama didn’t run on getting rid of gerrymandering. He didn’t run on election reform. He basically ran on health care reform, sane foreign policy, and fixing the economy that Bush broke. Those are the promises he made and those are the tasks he focused on. If he’d pushed voting reform in there he would have had to drop one of the other ones – hell people were urging him to drop health care reform from the day he took office. He had no interest in doing that so it didn’t get dropped.
Because that’s how change happens in this country. it doesn’t happen when one politician and his/her party get into office and then they can do whatever the fuck they want. It happens when a political party takes power on the promise of making specific changes. And then they work for decades to make those changes happen. Gerrymandering reform being staked out now as a Democratic position means that in 50 years we might have some level of reform on the issue. Does that suck? Yeah it does – it’s one artifact of us having a Federal system instead of a Parliamentary system. But it’s the way it works – somebody has to take the plunge and start making it a major issue before politicians can be elected to push that issue and make reform happen. It’s the way reform has happened in this country since the beginning, and I don’t see that dynamic changing anytime in the near future.
gvg
@shomi: sigh-we never had the advantage in my memory. States make state rules. Its a case where it has to be a real 50 state plan or just do it one by one. Did you really not know this?
Democrats have several important states where their local party seems to have died and not rebuilt. Florida is one. The party seemed to just die after Lawton Chiles died though I think it started sooner. We vote Democrat nationally but not as much locally.
NonyNony
@Matt McIrvin:
As always a reminder that if someone is pointing you at specific polls instead of polling averages, they either don’t know what they’re talking about or they have an agenda. Arguments made with polling averages can also have an agenda, but they have to be more reality based out of necessity due to the aggregation of the data.
raven
@Shell: Yesterday was low 80’s but it’s supposed to get even hotter this week.
Leland
It’s about time Dems started taking the down ballot/local races across the country seriously again.
Matt McIrvin
@NonyNony: Also, there’s statistical evidence that gerrymandering became much more electorally effective in the 2010 redistricting than in any previous cycle, because of the general availability of computer software for optimizing districts down to the last voter.
ChrisGrrr
@Elizabelle: For non-BJers to find, I’m driven to agree… and to type what nearly everyone would. I want a country with no gerrymandering, R or D.
Better ideas and plans can win. Even with the shocking number of potential voters now who cannot or will not educate themselves, I still believe.
A party illegally suppressing the participation of their “opponents” is even more vile than the most bigoted or self-serving policies set in motion. That is every bit as true whether the politicians are GOP or another party, IMO.
Timurid
And in other ‘news,’ CNN has pivoted back to the horse race.
The Establishment Media is disturbingly desperate for a white supremacist President…
raven
@Elizabelle: Here’s a shot of them hoping for a cookie from the crowd!
Shana
@Jim: On the other hand, we woke up this morning to poll results showing Hillary ahead 15 points in Virginia. So there’s that.
Feebog
The obvious places to start are those states with public referendum laws, such as California. That’s how we got our redistricting proposition passed. And not surprisingly, there were a great many Dems in safe seats who did not want to see it, they had theirs and that was it. But the consequences were that we won even more seats with fair districting, both at the state and congressional level. The most competitive districts drew better candidates who had to really fight to get elected. We still have a couple districts that Dems should win, this may be the year.
eclare
@raven: Looks like everybody had a good time!
trollhattan
@Feebog:
That was the CA Republicans hilariously outmaneuvering themselves. They created the redistricting commission only to forget that to make it work in their favor they also needed to stack said commission, which they promptly failed to do. Pity.
skerry
@StringOnAStick: Condolences to your family at this very sad time.
scav
@low-tech cyclist: One of the measures we included when attempting to build our version of regions. OK, travel time. Car along all roads (somewhat computationally nuts on a national scale, but we’ll assume it works for not, but then it also is dependent on quality of locally available street centerline files but that is alt least improving.) But then what about not accessibility for those without cars, do we include bus routes (pasically impossible) but walking should probably be accommodated at smaller scales. It’s certainly useful, but certainly a bit of a hairball . And, although it’s under the hood, there are still multiple techniques for generating routes which give different results so it’s usually best to run all those models multiple times.
It’s not that the ideas aren’t a part of it, it’s just it far more complicated and computationally expensive and it’s not a case of drop in in the computer and the single result pops out in a reasonable amount of time, especially on a national scale.
Shana
@Elizabelle: Closed at 3:30 on a Saturday? But I thought Trump closed up shop in Virginia in order to move resources to North Carolina. At least that’s what the campaign said….
raven
@eclare: It was so cool. They had no way of knowing how many folks would show up so imagine the joy of having the street just full of people. There we a few vendors at the coffee roaster the the parade ended and that all were happy as clams!
Gravenstone
@Jeffro: I’m not saying that we should plan according to anticipated Republican responses (aside from taking appropriate protections when warranted). Rather, I’m just pointing out that they’ll use it a the mother of all dog whistles/air raid sirens.
Elizabelle
@raven: Cookie? Bohdi wants him a gazelle.
You live in such a pretty area.
sukabi
@Shana: where WAS James Okeefe? He was nattering on the other day about some bombshell revelation…
Elizabelle
@Shana: We always heard rumors in Virginia that McCain’s 2008 offices were not staffed as fully or as late as Obama’s, but I have no personal knowledge there.
And the NC firebombing took out a printer — melted it — and dozens of yard signs. Sad!
Also: FWIW: I noticed that cars of our Dem volunteers were not necessarily plastered with Hillary bumperstickers. Way less than in previous years. Who wants to get your car keyed or your top slashed?
Bill
@Keith G: If I were a betting man – and to be clear I’m not – I’d put my money on it being a Trump supporter who listened to his leader trash the Republican party for the last month. Not a false flag operation, but someone who thinks the GOP is working against Trump.
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@Patricia Kayden: I was struck by the suggestion that this was near a large university, on a football weekend. So it could be apolitical destruction, just the sort of “youthful high spirits” that trashes a neighborhood after a big sports win (or loss, for that matter), I await the results of the investigation with interest, because I’d like to think we weren’t that stupid–and if it’s a false flag I want the world to know.
Keith G
@StringOnAStick:
From Joe Biden…modify as necessary:
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@Bostondreams: Maybe we just go with the Parliament Funkadelic Mothership instead. Are we ready for the Awesome Power of a Fully Operational Mothership?
Aleta
@StringOnAStick: Sorry for your loss. Condolences to you and your husband and family.
Cain
@NonyNony:
That said, we depended on the DNC to handle stuff like gerrymandering. They failed brilliantly. We need to make sure that not only do we have this, but we also encourage a new generation of progressive politicians to rise up. I still think we have a lot of Bill Clintonian era network of people who seem to encourage going rightward as a reaction to things happening. That’s one of the things I have been upset about. I feel like the Democratic party has gone more right for the past 20 years and we need to change that.
Also word, on the other parts of not having a complete majority, we need to make sure that we don’t have absolute control and that there is definitely a balance, without an adversary we will ourselves become corrupt.
Miss Bianca
@StringOnAStick: late back to this thread, but just wanted to give you my condolences.
artem1s
@NonyNony: The President was in CLE last week and the whole Clinton Party has been swarming thru Ohio since the first debate. I am hearing lots of radio ads where I usually don’t hear Dems advertise. They are strong ads designed to appeal to union friendly voters. That NAFTA crap is still a thing with white rural Ohioans. It’s taken some effort to break thru but I think the campaign is doing a good job of GOTV and the early voting numbers are very promising. The campaign is not giving up on Ohio at all. I think the Clinton campaign sees it as a way to smack down the ‘reasonable’ republican siren song of Kasich and Pence. It seems to be working so far. Ohio has swung about 6-8 points since the GOP convention. and Trump is running out of time to swing it back.
DissidentFish
@scav: This. It is trivial to create a redistricting algorithm; it is impossible to create one that all will see as fair. This is why Iowa and West Virginia’s approaches (requiring districts to follow existing county/city/town boundaries as much as possible) has it’s advantages, in that no one can argue that the existing boundaries don’t, in fact, exist. A plus for the watershed approach too.