So, the Texas Dems have returned to session and the Texas GOP will definitely push through their redistricting bill. The Texas Dems are claiming victory because California will redistrict to offset Texas. However.
All California is doing at the moment is calling for a vote to allow for redistricting, and I’m willing to bet that that vote fails; even if it passes, the resulting law will be subjected to infinite Republican challenges until after the election.
I am so. Fucking. Mad. That the Texas Dems returned to session and allowed this to happen.
Also, even if California does pass their maps, it just offsets Texas, but Florida and Ohio also already have their own redistricting in the works and I imagine other red states aren’t that far behind
When every red and blue state gerrymanders as hard as they can, Republicans will walk away with more seats and Dems will walk away with a bigger challenge to convince the average voter we believe in fair elections
Even worse, when every state becomes mired in district-fights, it is basically making the idea of representation hollow and pointless and eventually many states will stop participating in the fight when they can just form their own alliances and distribution of funds. It’s an end to democracy, the latest and most damaging irreversible wound against the union.
If this passes and the midterms are as fucked as I expect them to be, we will look back at the day the states started abandoning the union. And we don’t even have a better choice. This is what Trump and his people want and have forced the country’s hand and most people have ZERO idea what’s actually at stake or what’s happening with the redistricting fight.
Redistricting has to go to a public vote in CA, because Californians took the keys from legislators in 2008.
That said it’s looking like the legislature is going to put in on the ballot this week. The legislature is expected to vote yes.
It will come down the public in CA, and they have a recent history of passing legislation that tries to stop republicans from fucking with maps.
I think CA is going to come through. People are fucking pissed.
Gavin Newsom has the bully pulpit right now. Even Trump is glued to Newsom’s posts, speeches and interviews. There are a lot fewer uneducated people about this topic than usual because of that. And the protests have shown that people are willing to engage. So that gives a good deal of hope.
I’d also argue that the bully pulpit doesn’t mean much in this case. Legislators often vote against maps when it doesn’t favor them, and most of the democratic incumbents will be fine after this.
Also, the legislature doesn’t need to take a stand, the can simply say “I wanted to let the people decide.”
It’s a super safe vote for the CA legislators. They have little to lose.
I’m willing to bet that that vote fails
I think it has a very strong chance of passing actually.
But this isn’t the bright future we want. If it passes, we’re starting the slide of states-versus-states battling that will see the end to democratic representation entirely and possible an end to the union eventually.
And it’s not like we even have a better choice. We dissolve the union or live under corpo-fascist rule for the next century.
The goal was partly to bring national attention to this whole thing, which they very much succeeded at, getting multiple states, not just California, now looking to redistrict. Texas will likely push theirs through with the full knowledge that other states are currently and will to continue to fight this if they do.
Them returning to session was going to happen at some point, and they believed now is the right time. They’ve sent their message.
Texas Dems were bound to go home sooner or later. Most people can’t pay $15000 / month indefinitely to stop gerrymandering.
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If we’re real lucky some poor kid is gonna have to study this in history class like the Missouri Compromise
It should be 9. Extinct the mother fuckers.
The secret they don’t want to tell is that most states are already gerrymandered to hell.
I am willing to bet all of my money and put a second mortgage on my house that this will fail. Going by past Democrat action, they talk, they plan, they let the Republicans do what they want, they fail, they blame the Republicans. Johnson is already talking about how he’s going to stop it. He shouldn’t be able to, but the Democrats will let him.
They time to fight was the last 4 years. They did fuck all.
I’ll take that bet.
The state legislature looks like it will vote yes this week, and redistricting will likely go to the public in 3 months.
Redistricting is in the hands of the people in CA, so this will all depend on how pissed off people are and or how much disinformation is flying around the state.
I agree with you. This SHOULD happen. It SHOULD be in the hands of the voters, but the Dems have always found a way to hand the power to the fascists.
And then the Supreme Court will overturn…Checkmate.
Who’s supreme court? The supreme Court of California? The U.S. supreme Court has no authority there unless they rule it illegal to gerrymander in the U.S., which would restrict Texas, Florida, Ohio and whomever else doing so.
Other Dem States should do redristrict to get more seats.
Every dem state should because every Republican state will.
Play the game even if you’re going to lose.
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Translation: the Neoliberal (which is a center right to right wing ideology, not a left wing one) stranglehold on the state will be tightened whether voters want it to or not.
This is NOT good. That the GOP are doing it too does NOT mean that the Dems should.
“One person one vote unless the other team is cheating too” isn’t how you regain the trust of the electorate after a decade of helping to normalize fascism.
Yeah sorry, you’re about a decade late. I’m done with that attitude.
You’re on Team Enablers too, I see. Must be relaxing to have no standards or expectations for the people deciding the fate of the world.
Oh, shut up.
I’ll shut up when the lesser evil stops being an evil and starts faithfully representing the needs of their constituency or at least anything even vaguely resembling it.
Until then, I’ll keep pointing out that nothing improves when you accept “better than the fascists” as good enough and that the lyrics to this Skunk Anansie song are a Neoliberal opportunist talking to people exactly like you guys.
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Republicans have been playing dirty and keep winning by cheating. About time the Dems started playing dirty too.
When your opponent starts ratfucking their way into fascism the smart response is to start stockpiling weapons and preparing for war, not trying to outratfuck them. Or at least not just trying to play these silly political games.
Particularly because, as fascists, they’re doing both already.
That’s not something neoliberals could ever understand, however, so I guess we have to take this ultimately futile slide into illiberalism as another step on the inevitable decline.
