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Comment by rayiner | Hacker News Reader

> If the US were approximately an equal democracy, this might be less of an issue

Equal to what?

Equal in voting rights. Gerrymandering has been perfected by Republicans. Through that they manage to dilute votes of the opposition. Other measures discourage voters likely to vote against them, like people who cannot easily take time off to vote in person or who have changed their name. Blocking rank choice and maintaining first past the post also disenfranchise third parties, and reinforces the power of incumbents.

Trump himself admitted it's better for Republicans when fewer people vote.

?? Both sides happily gerrymander. It’s been around since 1812 and both sides are equally guilty at this point.

I didn't say democrats were innocent. I said Republicans perfected the (ab)use of districting.

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-...

Governors are elected by popular vote.

> Equal in voting rights. Gerrymandering has been perfected by Republicans. Through that they manage to dilute votes of the opposition.

This thread is talking about the Senate. The senate isn't gerrymandered. Both senators are state-wide races.

If you want to view it that way, you can view the senate as "pre-gerrymandered". But the last time that was an option was in 1959, and both of those are just "the entire area the US owned, but wasn't a state yet. To get senate gerrymandering, you have to go back to 1912 and the admission of New Mexico/Arizona.

Gerrymandering can affect voter sentiment and trigger polling location changes during redistricting, both of which can affect voter turnout[1][2][3] (though the research doesn't seem conclusive on the effect).

And thinking about it more, though I haven't seen if there are studies on it: there are probably manpower/fundraising effects from gerrymandering.

If you're able to protect your political power in one area that probably better enables you to amass resources to use in the area you can't gerrymander.

But all that said, both parties practice gerrymandering and I don't think there's strong evidence of a significant advantage over a major party from current gerrymandering at the national level.

[1] https://da.lib.kobe-u.ac.jp/da/kernel/90008864/90008864.pdf

[2] https://electionlab.mit.edu/articles/gerrymandering-turnout-...

[3] https://stateline.org/2022/05/20/check-your-polling-place-re...

> On a percentage basis, over three times as many districts were competitive in states where independent commissions drew maps as in states where Republicans drew maps.

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-...

That’s just confusing cause and effect. If your seats are safe, you have no reason to agree to forming an independent commission. The same is true in both heavily blue and heavily red states. Are districts more competitive in states where Democrats draw maps? I don’t think so.

This totally ignores values and motivations, and I would argue that only one group in your comment values winning at any cost.

I don’t even know which group you mean, but “my group has good values and motivations, but the enemy group just values winning at any cost” is exactly what a total partisan who values winning at any cost would say.

The evidence is that independent commissions drawing maps makes for more competitive districts. Which party is most opposed to such commissions? Which party is gleefully dismantling all accountability and oversight positions and departments? Which party is openly inviting corruption and pardoning those they should be prosecuting?

I wonder why one party would be seeking to change a civil service that’s 90% staffed by members of the other party? I guess “democracy” means Democrats running the country no matter who wins the election, right?

Democracy means "one person, one vote".

We all know which party is fighting tooth and nail against that on practically every issue that affects it.

Are most members of the civil service Democrats? This is the first I've heard of this.

OP asserts this unsource. While it does seem to tilt towards Democrats since it is ethics and mission oriented and typically requires a degree, 90/10 sounds wild in my experience.

My prior is based on experience. Most of the civilian govies are centrist, "I just want to grill" types.

That makes sense to me. This is why I suspected that attempting to claim the election was stolen would be a losing proposition; I was sadly surprised to the contrary.

Elections are run by Republicans as well as Democrats. In fact several of the key locations that Trump claimed were stealing the election from him were basically locations where the Republican party had a lock on the administration of the election. As I remind people often, when they talk about someone stealing the election, that's not a hypothetical "someone," that's Betty three houses down that has the nice flower garden and organizes the bake sale at church every month.

First, your stats are wild. Please provide and unbiased citation.

Second, your solution was in place in the 1800s and was referred to as the spoils system. It led to bad outcomes and was rightfully abandoned. Your beef is with the fact that educated people tend to choose policies that you don't like (assuming your 90/10 split, which is still wild). You/the GOP have three options. First is to recognize that the policies pursued do not attract people which education (which I consider a red flag). Second is to re-adopt the spoils system despite it being illegal, and frankly just sort of dumb since when the other side is in power you suffee, but at least then you never need to think deeply about making policy for the whole country instead of a subset of supporters. Third, you/the GOP self-own via tearing up all the intellectual capital and international good will built up over the decades without a replacement, massively reducing American influence on the world in all dimensions.

> If you want to view it that way, you can view the senate as "pre-gerrymandered".

That is quite explicitly the history of the US Senate (and House), FWIW.

The Connecticut Compromise was reached to give low-populations states outsized legislative power in the senate. This is the main reason the senate exists.

Building on that, the 3/5th compromise was reached as part of this to give slave states outsized legislative power in the house.

The state of Maine used to be part of Massachusetts, but it was later set up as an independent state in order to increase the number of anti-slavery states in the senate (the Missouri compromise).

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