May 26, 2015 By: Juanita Jean Herownself Category: Uncategorized
The good news: The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case on the constitutionality of Texas redistricting based on the one man / one vote principle.
The bad news: This Supreme Court is as worthless as a four card flush.
I thought about writing more about this, but that right there pretty much says it all.
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My name is Susan DuQuesnay Bankston. I live in Richmond, Texas, in the heart of Tom DeLay's old district. It's nuttier than squirrel poop here.
I am honored and privileged to know Miss Juanita Jean Herownself, hairdresser extraordinary and political maven. Since she does not have time to fiddle with this internet stuff, I type her website for her and you can read it if you want to. If you don't, she truly does not give a big bear's butt.
A lot of what I post here has to do with local politics, but you probably have the same folks in your local government.
This ain't a blog. Blogs are way too trendy for me. This is a professional political organization.
When it comes to redistricting, the Supremes have been more “reasonable” than at other times.
Just trying to give you some hope.
1Perhaps the Worthless 5 will just revert to the earlier one MAN (preferably white) / one vote principle that prevailed for so long.
25 of the Supremes aren’t worth a flying…..
3Pretty sure they’ll split 5-4 on the GOP being a person and redistricting falling within the free speech clause.
4Sigh! Dammit! I know what you mean, especially since they did such a “righteous” job on so many other things lately such as civil rights.
5Perhaps if we claimed that gerrymandering was a prelude to black helicopters with giant electromagnets coming to seize our guns…
6P.S.: the folks bringing the suit are basically trying to have the Supreme Court rule that children, college students, homeless people, etc. should not be counted for redistricting purposes.
7We may have to wait until after 2016 when the Democrats win the presidency and retake the Senate to have Supremes appointed by a Democratic President who will reverse the terrible wrongs this SCROTUS has done to our democracy.
8Now, now, they just want to revert to the time honored principle that holds that the best way to ensure good government is to only allow wealthy, white, property owners (preferably those who also belong to the right church), to vote.
All kidding aside, I’m more than a bit surprised by the court’s decision to hear this case. Despite decades of decisions on voting rights, the justices have traditionally steered clear of clarifying whether election districts should have an equal number of residents or an equal number of eligible voters. This is a big deal, particularly in states like Texas and California that have large numbers of minority citizens and non citizens.
The case was brought to the high court by Edward Blum, the same conservative activist whom the Supreme Court ruling in favor of when it struck down part of the Voting Rights Act two years ago. Blum also launched a constitutional challenge to the affirmative action policy at the University of Texas that is still pending. It goes without saying that he’s a real friend of the disenfranchised!
Back in the 60’s the court ruled on the basis of the 14th Amendment that states had to redistrict every decade based on population as determined by the census. States often did this on the basis of counties and as a result rural areas with smaller populations were VASTLY over represented (there were cases where boundaries hadn’t changed in more than 50 years!). Census data was determined at the time to be the most accurate and consequently the fairest method of determining representatives.
Furthermore, it’s my understanding that the data cited in the Texas case comes from a Census survey of about 2% of households that counts citizens. Now, I’m not a statistician and I don’t play one on TV but even I know that if you are only counting 2% of the households, there are going to be serious inaccuracies.
This is an attempt to disenfranchise: the homeless, young people (particularly those in college), poor people, members of minority groups and to a lesser extent the elderly. In other words anyone who might potentially vote Democratically.
9Obie’s immigration plans remain on hold thanks to the wingnut dominated 5th District Court of Apple Peels in N’awlins.
Dems need to be careful and not hand Latino voters an excuse to sit out elections or even worse-vote for wingnuts.
10Sigh. Grab you a haNdful of voter registration cards next time you’re in the post office or public library and hand them out at all the coffee houses, grocery stores, the homeless shelter, etc. and tell them why it’s worth their while to vote.
11Marge Wood, YES! Vote, vote and vote. We love us some Bernie, but if HRC wins the Democratic nomination, we’ll vote for her for two MAJOR reasons: no Rethug should ever occupy the White House, until their party tacks 95 degrees closer to sanity and no way, no how should there ever be another GOP appointment to SCROTUS.
12“children, college students, homeless people, etc. should not be counted for redistricting purposes.”
There’s a simple old Southern solution: count each of them as 3/5 of a person.
13The problem is that when they say one man, one vote, they mean it. They still haven’t gotten used to the notion that perhaps women should get to vote too. And when the say “man,” they don’t mean gays or Latinos or liberals.
14It IS a four-card flush: 4 hearts. Unfortunately 5 jokers beats 4 hearts.
We need one more heart on the court. President Clinton will address that during her two terms, I am certain.
15daChipster, I also vote for having at least 5 brains.
16Register and VOTE. Every election, every year; not just every fourth year when the Electoral College decides. Do your civic duty.
17The constitution even required that slaves be counted as 3/5 of person for purposes of assigning representatives to the states. Does that not mean that representation should be assigned based on people not registered voters. The Repubs are always demanding that we follow the original intent of the founding fathers. (How they know what original intent is unknown)
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