Gerrymandering US states in the name of liberalism
- Thread starter Alexander North
- Start date
I think I will try again and printscreen my attempts.
Edit: And here is my first attempt - tremble before the bordergore.
Edit: And here is my first attempt - tremble before the bordergore.
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Skallagrim
Banned
A very interesting tool. It mostly shows just how bizarre gerrymandering can (theoretically) get, really. Looking at the OTL map, there's just a lot of areas where one "side" controls one geographical region within a state, but the "other side" controls the region with the state's population majority. Despite how cool this tool is, I'm a bit surpised that the creator offers more gerrymandering as a "solution", of sorts. Seems to me that the problem is that in the USA, so many states' electoral votes get awarded based on "winner takes all". If electoral votes were always awarded proportionally, based on what percentage of the vote candidates have received... wouldn't that solve everything?
Only if one side gets a majority. If they don't, the election goes to the house, so the result depends on its composition.
Just for fun, I tried an extreme pro-Trump gerrymander. Without county-sized states and so on.
I managed to get down to 41 EVs for Hillary Clinton - and to very few states on top of that. Some of them (esp. Tennessee) are non-contiguous, but the states don't seem irredeemably ungovernable.
Make Tennessee and make Trump Great Again! Other great states are Texas, Utah, Idaho, Pennsylvania, Colorado,.
I managed to get down to 41 EVs for Hillary Clinton - and to very few states on top of that. Some of them (esp. Tennessee) are non-contiguous, but the states don't seem irredeemably ungovernable.
Make Tennessee and make Trump Great Again! Other great states are Texas, Utah, Idaho, Pennsylvania, Colorado,.
The other problem with this is that it would have to be instituted by individual states, and there are no solidly Democratic states that have completely Republican-controlled governments, or vice-versa, so no state really has the incentive to do that.
While I agree that proportionally rewarding electoral votes based on the state's total vote (instead of based on congressional district) would be superior to the current system, it seems like at that point we might as well just replace the electoral college with the popular vote - which both the creator and the linked Medium article advocate for.
Skallagrim
Banned
Well, yes. The electoral college has a bit of a function, though, in that it favours the smaller states a bit. Not exactly democratic, either, but if you go with popular vote under the present circumstances, big states and big cities are simply going to be the heart of every presidential electoral campaign ever. Small states will truly become "flyover country" with no power or relevance at all. Some may find that perfectly fine, but it strikes me as deeply unfair. The electoral college isn't exactly the best solution, of course, but the only alternative I see is ordering the biggest states to just be cut up into smaller states.
(Like, New York split in two, Florida split in two, Texas split in three and California in three or four. Something like that. For the sake of Congressional balance, you can cut them up so the number of typically 'red' and 'blue'-leaning states stays the same. And for presidential elections, that wouldn't matter if you go with popular vote. But it would ensure that there won't be a handful of states big enough to basically decide every single election. But, yeah: pipe dream.
)Back to gerrymandering it is!
Well, yes. The electoral college has a bit of a function, though, in that it favours the smaller states a bit. Not exactly democratic, either, but if you go with popular vote under the present circumstances, big states and big cities are simply going to be the heart of every presidential electoral campaign ever. Small states will truly become "flyover country" with no power or relevance at all. Some may find that perfectly fine, but it strikes me as deeply unfair. The electoral college isn't exactly the best solution, of course, but the only alternative I see is ordering the biggest states to just be cut up into smaller states.
(Like, New York split in two, Florida split in two, Texas split in three and California in three or four. Something like that. For the sake of Congressional balance, you can cut them up so the number of typically 'red' and 'blue'-leaning states stays the same. And for presidential elections, that wouldn't matter if you go with popular vote. But it would ensure that there won't be a handful of states big enough to basically decide every single election. But, yeah: pipe dream.
Back to gerrymandering it is!
I can't say that I really buy the argument that the electoral college gives small states any more relevance than they would have under a popular vote system. How could Vermont or Wyoming possibly be any less relevant than they currently are?
I also think that the "Electoral College favors small states" arguments loses more merit in the era of social media and big money campaigning. If the vote of every "Safe Blue State" Republican or "Safe Red State" Democrat could actually matter in choosing the President, then I think it would be much more likely to see presidential campaigns spamming every county in the country with cheap digital ads than just investing their money in the big cities/states.
As for the dividing of states ideas, I'm 100% down for that.
So while thinking about your two posts, I thought about a potential Electoral College "Compromise". Instead of the current system, what if electoral votes (that represent the number of state representatives) where determine proportionally (by state totals not by winners of congressional districts) but the two electoral votes that represent the senators was given to the "Total" winner of the state?
Admittedly, I still consider this system inferior to a popular vote, but it would give the popular vote more relevance while still maintaining 102 electoral votes that would be rewarded the old fashioned way.
Edit: So I did the (very rough) math for the results of the 2016 election based on my above proposal, and Trumps still wins by a few electoral votes, but yeah...
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Vuru
Banned
This dude can't make links for shit so i'll post a ss instead
Making Texas democrat feels like a crime against humanity tho, so i have to make something else as compensation
Redrew states so big cities aren't split. Caused some rather weird things on the coast, like a fucking huge DC
Making Texas democrat feels like a crime against humanity tho, so i have to make something else as compensation
Redrew states so big cities aren't split. Caused some rather weird things on the coast, like a fucking huge DC
Red Orm
Banned
>Other great state
>Texas and Colorado
One of these literally don't exist on your map
>Other great state
>Texas and Colorado
One of these literally don't exist on your map
Both exist de jure. However, CO encompasses Wyoming and Montana but none of the original CO...
No, because the Democrats won a plurality of votes nationally. Thus, we can't divide the U.S. into 51 states, all with Republican pluralities - the Democrats have to win somewhere.