People, Personas, and Politics 22 – “Gerry” Meet “Mander”
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner
Publication (Outlet/Website): People, Personas, and Politics
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2017/04/10
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Rick Rosner: And almost everybody is in a safe district. It is a district that cannot go to another party due to the demographics, and it’s gerrymandering that has led to the polarization because in a district that is safe, I believe, close to 90% of congressional districts are safe for one party or the other. The general election doesn’t matter because it is the winner of the primary for that district who is going to win the general.
In the primary, it is the bigger partisan lunatic who wins. So unless gerrymandering is gotten rid of, and is seen as unconstitutional or there is legislation passed to turn redistricting over to non political bodies, there may be a number of states who are stuck being brutally gerrymandered, and given the court is now 5-4 Conservative-Liberal. It may not be possible to win anti gerrymandering cases when they reach the Supreme Court.
But we’ll find out on two dates on whether it will happen at all or whether representative democracy will be truly representative again. We have 2018. Mid-terms are usually won the party that doesn’t have the presidency, but in the Senate, which is owned by the Republicans 52- 48. There are 25 democrats and only 8 or 9 Republicans running for re-election. So the democrats out of 33 seats up for grabs.
The democrats are running for re-election in ¾ of them. So the democrats will have to win more than ¾ of the Senate elections, 28 basically out of 33 elections, to flip the Senate, which is a crazy number to have to come through with. That’s almost 85% of the Senate that will have to go to the democrats. So it’ll be tough to take the Senate back.
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