Speed Bump by Dave Coverly for October 12, 2023

Actually not much of an exaggeration.

It is said that “there is no honor among thieves.” You won’t find much of it among political parties either.

Leaving redistributing to political entities — especially the one in power — is a recipe for unjust outcomes. Which is what we’ve been experiencing for quite some time.

Welcome to the North Carolina legislature.

Actually, I believe it. Who would want to make a baby with him?

Typical cheating mentality. Afraid of losing so cheat.

If you look up the history of gerrymandering, the original gerrymander district looked almost the same as the one depicted

I did the math on the effect of gerrymandering on the House of Representatives. First I looked at the actual D – R split by state. Then I looked at the popular vote split for president (a state wide result impervious to gerrymandering).

For example Alabama has 1 Democratic Representative and 6 Republican Representatives but the popular vote was 37.1% Democrat and 62.9% Republican. If split along these lines the Democrats should have 3 Representatives and the Republican 4 Representatives. So the Democrats have two less than they should have and the Republicans two more.

Here are some state breakdowns Actual D / Actual R / Should have D / Should have R / Swing number in favor of party

Alabama 1 / 6 / 3 / 4 / 2R

Arkansas 0 / 4 / 1/ 3 / 1R

California 40 / 12 / 34 / 18 / 6D

Georgia 5 / 9 / 14 / 14 / 6R

New Jersey 9 / 3 / 7 / 5 / 2D

New York 15 / 11 / 16 / 10 / 1R

Texas 13 / 25 / 18 / 20 / 5R

12 states have a zero swing (fairly equitable). 19 states have a swing of 1 (I also consider this “fair.”) 15 states have a swing favorable to the Democrats. 24 states have a swing favorable to the Republicans.

Overall, the swing is 14 Representatives in favor of the Republicans. Replace 14 Republicans with 14 Democrats and control of the House flips.

There is actually a computer font that is made up of Congressional Districts. Mine is in the letter C.

You can’t draw anything that good on an Etcha-Sketch. All you get is squiggly lines, at best. Maybe someone, somewhere, can do better, though.

Easy solution. A law that says a district border cannot have more than 6 tangent lines.

Hmm, seems like both sides do the same thing when in power!

And the Ohio legislature.

This is along the same line as saying GWB was incompetent, or “mistakes were made”, or “we didn’t know enough when we started”. Hanlon’s Razor is not only backwards, it’s extreme. Instead of “never ascribe to malice what can be expained by stupidity”, it should be “Malice is a more likely explanation for harmful behavior than is stupidity”.

so it’s not an accident then…

It looks a lot like parts of the 2013 map of Maryland’s congressional districts.