Congress

America’s Most Gerrymandered Congressional Districts

Contrary to one popular misconception about the practice, the point of gerrymandering isn't to draw yourself a collection of overwhelmingly safe seats. Rather, it's to give your opponents a small number of safe seats, while drawing yourself a larger number of seats that are not quite as safe, but that you can expect to win comfortably. Considering this dynamic, John Sides of The Washington Post's Monkey Cage blog has argued convincingly that gerrymandering is not what's behind the rising polarization in Congress

What 60 years of Political Gerrymandering Looks Like

"Some of these goals run right up against each other," he writes. "While a compact district may be desirable, it doesn’t necessarily reflect how people live or what county and city boundaries look like." Or, as John succinctly puts it, "Representation is about people, not polygons."

In both readings Christopher Ingraham talks about how the Republican Party has lost site as to what gerrymandering is supposed to be. It was created so that both parties can have equal representation in a state. Instead the Republican Party has created this system so that they can have a larger number of seats that they can win safely and their opponents have a smaller number of safe seats. In the other quote he also talks about how there are many different situations that play a factor in each district. The Republicans are focused on the amount of seats they can uphold rather than the representation of the people. 

Gerrymandering plays a big part in the presidential elections. It can in some cases determine who will be the president. What I thought was interesting is the way the Republicans play the system so that they can have more seats. It also made me think about the 2000 election with George W. Bush and Ale Gore. Ale Gore won most of the popular votes, on the other hand George W. Bush won the electoral votes which made him President. Reading this article and from these quotes it shows me that he won unfairly and it also makes me think about the fact that the government doesn’t really care about fighting for me but rather on things that benefit them.