You all know we could go through this tit for tat exercise forever without settling anything. The last 30 years or so have seen a change in politics that broke the stasis of the FDR/WW2 democratic party domination. Any political stasis is destabilizing in the long run and the dem supremacy in congress from 1932-1992 resulted in a political enviornment that was unhealthy. For all the success of WW2 the dem congress had reached the end of its rope. Remember it was the rep rump in congress that was the reason that LBJs civil rights work passed. Likewise the last gasps of the FDR social programs taken by LBJ were over reach and caused more problems tah the solved. (see Pat Moynihan's speeches and papers backed by treasury and other department data about the 60's welfare programs and the destruction of the family). First Newt schemes to take out Jim Wright and destroy the dem majority and succeeds in 94. He takes shots and plays dirtier than Gerald Ford and Bob Michael and shows how modern politics is done. Dems bitter from losing their "right" to be a majority forever start pushing back and playing a little dirtier. Reps respond...dems respond etc until we are where we are today. In addition modern gerrymandering by computer establishes safe disctricts for both far right reps and far left dems. Don't tell me Pelosi and her cronies are mainstrean or even close. Now they don't talk to each other, they talk past each other and only to the most fervent of their supporters. We need competitive congressional districts based on population by number rather than by specific content (race, wealth, etc). If you belive what you preach you shouldn't be afraid to test your ideas in the open market. It means nothing to preach to the saved. A truly competitive congressional apportionment will limit the appeal of the true believer demogogues of either side and force both sides to find a way to work in the real world.
On districting I agree. There should be no biases one way or the other. I agree that if you are not willing to run on your ideas then you shouldn't be running to begin with. This being said, the very same could be said of the current Republican efforts in swing states to reduce voting hours and require identification at the voting booths. They claim that it is all in an effort to maintain voting integrity but there have been roughly 4-5 cases where people were convicted of voting fraud or attempted voting fraud in the past four Presidential elections. It just doesn't happen enough to justify purging voter roles, limiting voting hours and requiring forms of identification that in many cases disenfranchises voters from both parties: elderly for Republicans and minorities for Democrats. Like you said, if you believe what you preach you shouldn't be afraid to test your ideas on the open market and you shouldn't need to limit the number of voters from the other side.
Tiger in NC I agree that limiting access is not in the public interest and I don't approve of some of the rules engaged. However I have seen fraud in large measure. ACORN was documented to have bussed voters to multiple voting centers and having voters cast multiple votes in the same election in New Orleans, Chicago and other cities as recently as 2004. For that they lost accreditation and federal funding. Some should have gone to jail. I believe that photo identification at least should be required. It takes more to get on an airplane or cash a check or buy liquor or cigaretesn than to cast a vote. There are ways to provide means to get legal voters properly registered and proper identification to vote. I am very much against same day registration and similar tools to make casting a vote easy.. I believe that it takes an interested and informed voting citizenary to have an effective democracy. If someone isn't interested enough to go through the process to register, obtain confirmation of eligibility is is a sign he or she is not interested enough to cast a responsible vote. BTW if someone doesn't have the means to make it to a voting booth I have NO problem with them being provided transportation by anyone.
That's the opposite of a retraction, dufus. There's tons of evidence on foxnews and wash times that college profs are liberal elitists that brainwash students.
