Cockmaster Flash - 2013-06-26
I'm sure it's just an coincidence that VoterID bills and laws were either introduced or went into effect in the several Confederate states only after the VRA was gutted.
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godot - 2013-06-26
Counterpoint: the VRA made it easy for Republican state legislatures to gerrymander minorities into safe minority districts, while producing more slight-Republican majority suburban districts. This increased minority representation while removing Democrats from power.
Not that they wouldn't do the same without the VRA - its just that the VRA gave legal cover for the gerrymandering.
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asian hick - 2013-06-27 In the political science literature this is known and the tradeoff between descriptive and substantive representation. Does increasing the number of minorities elected to legislature/Congress outweigh fewer seats won by the party ostensibly supportive of minority concerns? Saying it does not makes the assumption that the Democratic Party in these states cared sufficiently about unique minority issues that white Democrats would have provided the same policy attention to minority issues as did minority representatives. I'm not sure I buy that.
Also, there are two types of gerrymandering: cracking and packing. Creating minority districts does the first. Concentrating many Democrats in one district so that there are fewer in surrounding districts. However, now that the Republican Party is stronger in the South, these minority districts are fast becoming the few places that Democrats can win seats.
The gutting of the VRA will allow Republicans to "crack" concentrations of minorities; splitting them up amongst Republican districts where there are too few in any one district to win an election.
For example, I'm guessing Mississippi's 2nd congressional district (encompassing the Delta) is liable to get split apart among the other three districts, creating four Republicans elected out of the state instead of three.
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lordyam - 2013-06-26
in all fairness, this law should apply to all 50 states, and thats why it was stuck down. now we just need our congress to write that law; passing laws are what theyre good at.
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Jet Bin Fever - 2013-06-27 Yep, won't be hard at all to pass a bill that straightforward and logical, because Congress really cares about the voters.
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wackyakmed - 2013-06-27
Right, blame Nader and O'Connor, and not our awful political system that we should be fighting to replace.
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bac - 2013-06-27
Anybody care to enlighten my ignorant as as to what Nader and O'conner have to do with this?
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godot - 2013-06-27 Nader's 2000 run was responsible for the election of GWB, and Justice O'Connor's 2006 retirement lead to Justic Alito on the bench.
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Gommorrah - 2013-06-27
your choice of who to blame is pretty weird
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