California has a special election this year, and I’m following my routine of discussing my choices, with the intent of normalizing the voting process. It won’t be too long this time, because there’s just one proposition. Well, there’s also a local measure, but I tend not to discuss those.
Proposition 50: Yes
This is pro-gerrymandering legislation, and counterintuitively, I’m in favor of it!
Since 2008, California has adopted model anti-gerrymandering legislation. Congressional districts are drawn by an independent bipartisan committee. It’s not like I follow what they do in detail, but I hear very good things about it. And also, in principle, I think it’s the correct way to do it.
I am aware that among geeks, there is a popular proposal to draw congressional districts purely using math. I strongly oppose this idea. The thing that people often miss is that mathematically “neutral” methods are not really neutral. They tend to favor the political interests of people who are sparsely distributed over a broad geographic region, i.e. rural interests. In the US, that often means Republicans. It’s nuts to me that geeks have failed to realize this and are unwittingly advocating a pro-Republican policy. In my research into gerrymandering, I think it’s a lot more complicated than people give credit for, and there’s no clear “correct” answer. I think it’s appropriate for actual humans to make the decisions, with consideration of cultural and geographic boundaries that are not captured in mathematical models.
Anyway, that’s my spiel in favor of California’s current policy. Why am I in favor of changing it?
Well the problem with anti-gerrymandering, is that it reduces California’s power compared to other states. We enact anti-gerrymandering legislation, so we send a more diverse set of voices to Congress. But Republicans have no interest in anti-gerrymandering legislation, they only enact policies that benefit themselves. Proposition 50 is a response to recent Texas redistricting policy, which is explicitly being redesigned to favor Republicans, with Trump support. They’re not playing fair. For us to play fair would be unilateral disarmament.
California has demonstrated model anti-gerrymandering legislation, and that’s great. But what has also been demonstrated, is that anti-gerrymandering legislation needs to be mandated on the Federal level. It is not enough for only the pro-democracy states to do it, while the fascist party just takes advantage.
Another neat thing about Prop 50 is that it automatically expires in 2030, at which point we can reconsider this decision.
i can’t wait for WA, OR, NY, etc to get a chance to do similar things, assuming they have the political will. or alternately, for the country to stop being a fascist bloodbath long enough to make it unnecessary. don’t take this as support for newsom. he could do a million great things and still deserve to get primaried into the motherfucking mariana trench, that piece of shit.
I dropped off my ballot a week or so ago – pretty much right after I received it.
Yeah, gerrymandering is bad, but if only one “side” does something about it, it just makes the problem worse.
Some problems can’t be effectively addressed at a state level, because then the state just takes on the burden of the nation. Mostly I’m thinking right now of gerrymandering and humanely providing housing for unhoused folk.
It’s borderline absurd how much the constitution favors rural people over urban people – the house of representatives, electoral college votes, gerrymandering and federal funds distribution, etc. Yet, rural folk can’t stop whining about how the “coastal elites” have too much power, when it’s exactly the opposite.
I live in Oakland, CA,, which has just a slightly smaller population than all of fucking Wyoming, so my city gets a small portion of a single senator and a portion of a house member, while Wyoming gets two senators and a full house member, in addition to having a full 3 electoral votes, while proportionately, the population of Oakland gets a not quite 1-1/2.
And then there is the issue of more federal funds (from income taxes, etc.) going to red states than blue states. So we are literally funding and supporting these states electing regressive idiots to cut all of us down at the knees and hobble progress.
I know it’s been tied to Russian disinfo campaigns and all to sow division, but that division is already here and baked in. At this point, I’d really like to see some sort of Calexit/Pacific state secession, if for nothing else than that we can stop funding and getting dragged down into fascism with all that’s going on…
In Washington to do a redistricting in a year not ending with 1 requires a constitutional amendment, and this requires a 2/3 vote in both chambers of the legislature, so all we can do is keep working on increasing D representation in the legislature so that one day such things may be possible. By then I doubt redistricting this way will still be relevant, but the most important thing is we will be able to finally implement a progressive state income tax.