{"id":15605,"date":"2018-05-11T08:58:32","date_gmt":"2018-05-11T13:58:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/?p=15605"},"modified":"2018-05-11T08:58:32","modified_gmt":"2018-05-11T13:58:32","slug":"ohio-redistricting-suffers-one-fatal-flaw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2018\/05\/11\/ohio-redistricting-suffers-one-fatal-flaw\/","title":{"rendered":"Ohio Redistricting Suffers One Fatal Flaw"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ohio is another state which has been gerrymandered by the GOP<\/strong><\/em>, who have retained a vast majority in the legislature ever since. However, they’ve apparently been watching what’s been happening to other states such as Pennsylvania<\/a> (GOP gerrymander) and Maryland<\/a> (Democratic gerrymander) and decided to be proactive on the matter. They offered an Amendment to the Ohio Constitution on the matter, known as Issue 1, to change the process from a simple majority vote + signature of the governor to a more complext process, as described<\/a> in Vox<\/strong><\/em> by Andrew Prokop:<\/p>\n

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  1. To start off, the Ohio legislature would be tasked with drawing a new map. But they could no longer pass it with a simple majority vote. They\u2019d need three-fifths support\u00a0and<\/em>\u00a0the support of at least half the members of both major parties, in each chamber, as well as the governor\u2019s signature.<\/li>\n
  2. If there\u2019s no deal, the congressional map-drawing would be punted over to the seven-member Ohio commission that exists to handle the state legislature\u2019s redistricting. Here, again, bipartisanship would be necessary \u2014 at least two minority-party members would have to agree to approve a new map.<\/li>\n
  3. If the commission fails, the job would be tossed back to the Ohio legislature. In that case, the threshold for success would fall, but bipartisanship would still be necessary to pass a map \u2014 at least one-third of each party\u2019s members would have to vote for it, to pass it and send it for the governor\u2019s signature.<\/li>\n
  4. Finally, if all these efforts fail, the legislature would be permitted to pass a map with simple majority support. But the catch is that this new map would only last four years, rather than the usual 10. And again, the governor\u2019s signature would be required.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/blockquote>\n

    From the same article:<\/p>\n

    \u201cI think it largely enshrines the process that we have,\u201d says Republican state Sen. Matt Huffman. \u201cIt still leaves it in the hands of the majority party in the legislature, because people elected the majority party to make these decisions. But it also enshrines the concept of minority rights.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    Not really. This will be an opportunity for corruption in three ways, all related to the commission in #2. First, there’s old-fashioned bribery, whether it’s cash or special consideration for the minority party members of the commission. Second, what’s to keep a member of the commission from switching parties? And, related to number two, the third would be a ‘mole’ in the other party, although that’s admittedly a little far-fetched.<\/p>\n

    And since step 4 exists, the status quo is maintained in the event of failure. Big win for the Republicans. In fact, step 4 is the hammer of the process – Either agree to our marginally better map or you’re stuck with the Big Bad One for another four years!<\/em> It’s all about the power politics, folks.<\/p>\n

    The best way to do these things is to have an objective, non-political mechanism. So far, I haven’t seen one for the American system, but that doesn’t mean one cannot be devised. Perhaps having the judiciary devise a redistricting map as constrained by the efficiency gap<\/a> would work. I haven’t given it a lot of thought.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Ohio is another state which has been gerrymandered by the GOP, who have retained a vast majority in the legislature ever since. However, they’ve apparently been watching what’s been happening to other states such as Pennsylvania (GOP gerrymander) and Maryland (Democratic gerrymander) and decided to be proactive on the matter. \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15605"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15605\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15608,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15605\/revisions\/15608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}