Politics: A new beginning

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
Are you suggesting that a close matching of the wishes of voters to the outcome of an election is somehow less than desirable? I'm confused. If I'm reading you correctly, you are saying that disproportional representation, skewed to maintain someone's chosen values, is the better alternative.

I think he's saying that, if you really want to find a close matching of the outcome of elections to the wishes of voters -- keep sensible districts and use multi-member districts, and/or use a PR system with one statewide "district" (i.e the 22 Texas representatives allocated among parties by a PR system based on the total votes statewide.)

He's suggesting that such a system would be preferable to distorting voting districts beyond all rational comprehension and then claiming to reflect the will of the voters just because the number of R's/D's elected statewide is closer to the % of votes cast statewide -- while at the same time some communities may be almost entirely deprived of the power to influence the choice of their legislator.

S_A_M

[Gattigap]

Authorities have disrupted a plot involving WMD in .... Texas.

The LA Times is reporting that "officials believe they may have uncovered one of the most audacious domestic terrorism plots since the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people. Starting with a single piece of mail, investigators discovered an enormous cache of weapons in Noonday, in East Texas, including the makings of a sophisticated sodium cyanide bomb capable of killing thousands of people."

Authorities have been working on this case since early 2002, apparently. The militia numbnuts have been arrested, pled guilty, and are now facing sentencing.

My favorite part:

With Bruey's permission, they searched a storage facility the couple had rented. The firepower inside shocked law enforcement officers. Investigators found nearly 500,000 rounds of ammunition, 65 pipe bombs and briefcases that could be detonated by remote control. Most distressing, they said, was the discovery of 800 grams of almost pure sodium cyanide — material that can only be acquired legally for specific agricultural or military projects. The sodium cyanide was found inside an ammunition canister, next to hydrochloric, nitric and acetic acids and formulas for making bombs. If acid were mixed with the sodium cyanide, an analysis showed, it would create a bomb powerful enough to kill everyone inside a 30,000-square-foot facility, investigators said.

McVeigh has nothing on the people, apparently.

I'm amazed that this case has not received more publicity.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Authorities have disrupted a plot involving WMD in .... Texas.

The LA Times is reporting that "officials believe they may have uncovered one of the most audacious domestic terrorism plots since the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people. Starting with a single piece of mail, investigators discovered an enormous cache of weapons in Noonday, in East Texas, including the makings of a sophisticated sodium cyanide bomb capable of killing thousands of people."

Authorities have been working on this case since early 2002, apparently. The militia numbnuts have been arrested, pled guilty, and are now facing sentencing.

Sounds like Ashcfoft found Dr. Whoopie's bunker.

S_A_M

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Authorities have disrupted a plot involving WMD in .... Texas.

I'm amazed that this case has not received more publicity.

There was an article on the lack of publicity in this case in the Christian Science Monitor last week. http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/1229/p02s01-usju.html

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
And of course, if one argues that the proportion of Democratic reps should roughly approximate the proportion of people who voted for Democrats, then one might want to re-look at the 2000 presidential election and wonder if that was a democratic process.

Whiff (as per TM). There's no electoral college for congressional elections, plus the thesis is just a perpetuation of the existing back-and-forth games. Are you arguing that proportional representation is a bad thing?

Someone, I think it was the Houston Chronicle, suggested that a computer randomly draw maps without political input. Put in the geography and VRA requirements in and go with whatever the computer spits out. I think that everyone in the legislature would pass out if that happened.

That would work, I think. Of course, the next fight would be over how to translate broad VRA mandates into discrete instructions.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
He's suggesting that such a system would be preferable to distorting voting districts beyond all rational comprehension and then claiming to reflect the will of the voters just because the number of R's/D's elected statewide is closer to the % of votes cast statewide -- while at the same time some communities may be almost entirely deprived of the power to influence the choice of their legislator.

I understand this, and agree. My only point was, is he saying that a flawed system that is further from reflecting reality than a later flawed system is somehow better, or even as good?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
I think he's saying that, if you really want to find a close matching of the outcome of elections to the wishes of voters -- keep sensible districts and use multi-member districts, and/or use a PR system with one statewide "district" (i.e the 22 Texas representatives allocated among parties by a PR system based on the total votes statewide.)

He's suggesting that such a system would be preferable to distorting voting districts beyond all rational comprehension and then claiming to reflect the will of the voters just because the number of R's/D's elected statewide is closer to the % of votes cast statewide -- while at the same time some communities may be almost entirely deprived of the power to influence the choice of their legislator.

S_A_M

What he said, basically. I have no problem conceptually with matching districts to reproduce the "results of elections," except that the only "results" you're looking at involve who voted for which party. There are a whole bunch of different factors that one could look at instead, especially in a big state like Texas -- urban/rural, men/women, white/black/Hispanic, gay/straight, religion, etc. I'm not saying that any one of these should control -- I'm saying that none should. If legislative districts matched

At the risk of outing myself, I used to work for a Republican legislator in a large state. Shortly before I went to work with him, a federal court had overturned the legislative districts for the state house, which had involved electing representatives by county, with each county getting a number of reps proportionate to the county's share of the population. Under the court ruling, the state was divided into x districts, where x was the number of representatives, and these districts no longer tracked county borders. My boss made out quite well, and got himself a safe district, but one that gave him a bunch of constituents in the next county, to whom he had no connection. He thought the change was terrible, just for the way that it separated legislators from the voters.

But, notwithstanding BRC's suggestion, it's hard to find a neutral way to structure these things, which works to the benefit of the politicians, who -- without regard to party affiliation -- would prefer lots of safe districts. Democrats are no better than Republicans in this regard, except that in Texas and Colorado we have seen the GOP push the issue in a new way. So DeLay et al. are more ruthless.

Originally posted by bilmore
My only point was, is he saying that a flawed system that is further from reflecting reality than a later flawed system is somehow better, or even as good?

Our posts are crossing, but my point is that you have too narrow a view of the "reality" you are trying to reflect if the only thing you're looking at is party affiliation.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by bilmore
Whiff (as per TM). There's no electoral college for congressional elections, plus the thesis is just a perpetuation of the existing back-and-forth games. Are you arguing that proportional representation is a bad thing?

My point is that the system is as it is and pointing at unfairness of representation based on people using the system to their advantage isn't necessarily a viable solution. I don't disagree with the electoral college system, I'm just pointing out that popular vote does not always equal the proportionate result.

That would work, I think. Of course, the next fight would be over how to translate broad VRA mandates into discrete instructions.

Well, that and the invevitable comparison to the BSC computer.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
My point is that the system is as it is . . .

Okay, but I think that's Delay's point today, too.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by bilmore
Okay, but I think that's Delay's point today, too.

I'm not so sure. The system was to redistrict in 2001, after the census, which as far as I can tell was properly done. This went outside of the system and I think will hurt Texas politics more than it will help US politics.

On the good news front, the good voters of the city of Houston resisted an effort to turn the non-partisan city-wide election into an ugly partisan mess. Our new mayor has vowed to fix the ugly traffic light synchonization situation as his first act in office, and he's already talking with the cops about what they want in a new chief of police.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
I'm not so sure. The system was to redistrict in 2001, after the census, which as far as I can tell was properly done. This went outside of the system and I think will hurt Texas politics more than it will help US politics.

Okay. It just strikes me that a "save the integrity of the system" argument that values process over result is what you (and I) use when we don't like the result.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
Okay. It just strikes me that a "save the integrity of the system" argument that values process over result is what you (and I) use when we don't like the result.

Are you being obtuse, or do you have some other way of explaining away the fact that Republicans in Texas and Colorado were redistricting in the middle of the decade, as has not been done? When RT talks about the integrity of the system, I hear her as saying that redistricting is necessary but divisive and costly, and it therefore makes sense to observe the norm that it happen once every 10 years, after the census. Obviously there's no law against it.

edited to say:

I didn't give enough credit to your observation about process vs. result, but I can't believe that a lawyer would not entertain arguments about process as legitimate. There are such obvious reasons to avoid fights about process in contentious proceedings like, e.g., redistricting.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
I didn't give enough credit to your observation about process vs. result, but I can't believe that a lawyer would not entertain arguments about process as legitimate. There are such obvious reasons to avoid fights about process in contentious proceedings like, e.g., redistricting.[/i]

That's why I indicated that I use the same integrity-of-process arguments when they suit my needs. That's why you argue for the precedential value of RvW while prolifers argue the substance of Constitutional text. We're all more results-oriented than I think we want to perceive ourselves.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by bilmore
Okay. It just strikes me that a "save the integrity of the system" argument that values process over result is what you (and I) use when we don't like the result.

I think you're right. In this case, there are so many twists and turns along the way that were used to "maximize" the process to get the result that people wanted that it's very difficult to determine what is right. Assuming that the Democrats wanted to keep the status quo and the Republicans wanted to redistrict, everyone started looking for ways to meet those particular ends.

The Democrats drew a work of art in 1991. As far as I can tell, this is the only result and process that everyone can live with, though some charge that it was an unfair map due to party representation issues. The Republicans fought work of art at the 2001 census debates, ended up deadlocked and court ended up drawing map. Unfair result and bad process, say Republicans. The Republicans reintroduced the issue in the next session, excluded Democrats from participating in discussions about the map in April, and brought the issue to vote before anyone even looked at it. Unfair result and bad process, say the Democrats. The Democrats left the state twice to thwart Republican efforts. Unfair result and bad process, say Republicans. Republicans change a couple of senate rules to try and get a quorom. Unfair result and bad process, say Democrats. Finally, Democrats come home and the Republicans get everything worked out after nearly a month of fighting amongst themselves, in October. (Charges of unfairness coming from Democrats regarding shitty parking assignments and fines as punishment for leaving the state not really relevant here.)

I think that the result from the court yesterday was pretty much, yeah, unfair, but as far as we can tell the process was ok, though we really would like some guidance from the Supremes on this one.

edited to add: Whatever the ultimate result, I would like to avoid these fights more than absolutely required by the constiution, especially in years where the state's coffers are very low and my income is somewhat impacted by how much money the state has that year.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
That's why I indicated that I use the same integrity-of-process arguments when they suit my needs. That's why you argue for the precedential value of RvW while prolifers argue the substance of Constitutional text. We're all more results-oriented than I think we want to perceive ourselves.

Speak for yourself. I mean, the fact that you are cynical doesn't make us all cynics.