Texas lawmaker's arrogance about Biden and vaccines turns into a hilarious Larry David moment

IDK maybe his good eye will remain blinded. Dark world of the GOP will envelope him in the best of ways.

2 Likes

Are we sure that they are not trying to do some sort of weird summoning rituals with the shape of the gerrymandered districts?

11 Likes

Holy cats! Imagine being so unpopular you need to torture actual geography for any hope of getting elected!

7 Likes

Kittehs are indeed cute. But not much high weirdness there, nor much in the way of interesting ideas. :smile_cat:

1 Like

It’s not about one person getting elected, it’s about making sure that the other side has all their voters in as few districts as is possible.

8 Likes

True for one, true for all, right?

(Such extreme gerrymandering is an admission of gross unpopularity of an entire political party)

6 Likes

the problem is they’re also the people who set the rules and then block new ones from getting made.

all of the new voter suppression laws, all of the anti trans legislation, they way they use the filibuster in the senate - they’ve long since given up their own rituals and rules in an attempt to keep power.

7 Likes

The end result is the same, but it is important to recognise the difference in how it is done.

I have had Republicans try the both sides argument on me by claiming that it the Democratic party who are fixing things so they win districts by huge numbers, even though there is no advantage for them to do that.

9 Likes

I dunno. This might be hilarious if we got to see Rep. Crenshaw’s actual response (or non-response).

Yeah, he’d probably dissemble and deflect, but then it would actually be funny. Or, who knows, maybe he would acknowledge Biden’s achievement, and admit to being impressed. I know the guy is a royal asshole, but it seems juvenile to pre-emptively cue up the trumpet music. Give him time to earn his Curb Your Enthusiasm moment.

Unfortunately this is one case where both-sides-ism holds more than a grain of truth. Here in MD our congressional districts defy geometric logic, and was part of the Supreme Court case arguing that extreme gerrymandering violated the constitution.

Even though I am in favor of MD’s more progressive policies, I am still supportive of more rational districting, as I think it both increases the franchise, but will also require politicians to focus more on policy and be more responsive to the needs and desires of their constituents.

I know, I’m a naive optimist.

4 Likes

Here in MD our congressional districts defy geometric logic…

I imagine your congressional district geometry would have horrified dear old H.P. Lovecraft, who wrote, in a slightly different context,

…the geometry of the dream-place he saw was abnormal, non-Euclidean, and loathsomely redolent of spheres and dimensions apart from ours.

9 Likes

I’d like to impress the sole of my boot on this troglodyte’s face.

3 Likes

I don’t understand why the districts aren’t simply based on states’ counties. Type about being naive!

3 Likes

Because counties don’t have an even population distribution, which is a requirement for representational districts.

9 Likes

Texas contains both Harris County (which Crenshaw represents part of) with a population of over 4 million, and Loving County with a population of 82.

4 Likes

Thank you. @AlexG55’s reply makes gerrymandering even more, um, interesting.

4 Likes

Or spread out so that they can’t win any seats.

Two principal tactics are used in gerrymandering: “cracking” (i.e. diluting the voting power of the opposing party’s supporters across many districts) and “packing” (concentrating the opposing party’s voting power in one district to reduce their voting power in other districts).

10 Likes

And it was made part of the Supreme court case because it is one of the relatively few states that is Gerrymandered in favor of Democrats.

1 Like

(and then complain because that’s not the right way to hammer a nail)

So very true, which is why it is a grain of truth, and not a 500 lbs salt block of truth. :wink: