The Supreme Court is allowing California to use its new congressional map for this year’s midterm election, clearing the way for the state’s gerrymandered districts as Democrats and Republicans continue their fight for control of the U.S. House of Representatives.
The state’s voters approved the redistricting plan last year as a Democratic counterresponse to Texas’ new GOP-friendly map, which President Trump pushed for to help Republicans hold on to their narrow majority in the House.
And in an unsigned order released Wednesday, the high court’s majority denied an emergency request by the California’s Republican Party to block the redistricting plan. The state’s GOP argued that the map violated the U.S. Constitution because its creation was mainly driven by race, not partisan politics. A lower federal court rejected that claim.
Well that is a bad, hopefully disingenuous take. The goal in California was not to move the needle with corruption and perversion of democracy. It was to prevent the needle from moving with corruption and perversion of democracy (by the Trump Administration and other corrupt GOP governors and legislatures), which, unfortunately required the same perversion to accomplish. It never should have been necessary or allowed for EITHER party to do this to ANY state. It’s fucked up that it is or ever was allowed, and needs to be fixed as soon as humanly possible. But under those circumstances to not respond to your corrupt counterpart pulling the needle their way by pulling it back yourself is to allow the corruption to overwhelm everyone and everything. It’s self-defense. The moral highground that results in boots on your neck is not a path forward.
I get where you’re coming from and totally get why I’m getting downvoted. I understand that people are interpreting “the needle” to be measuring “evil.”
This is where the spirit of my comment is coming from. We can all agree that gerrymandering is bad, since it’s usually used to artificially boost power. Also, anyone paying attention and not lying to themselves can see that really fucked up shit happens when Conservatives are allowed to artificially boost their power. You are correct that this is a helpful move in the short term.
In the long term; the kind of timelines that those who maliciously support the Fairness Doctrine, Citizens United, and the Patriot Act think on; this is furthering a dangerous precedent.
I’m going to try explaining my concern using a ridiculous analogy.
Begin analogyLet’s say you’ve got a coworker named Taylor, and Taylor poops on the floor. Not just once! Like, often. So, everyone makes Taylor clean up their poop. And then the boss angrily tells Taylor to stop pooping on the floor. Taylor learns their lesson. For a little bit. But then they poop on the floor again. Just a little bit. Just to test the waters. But everyone catches on immediately and puts a stop to it. The boss even puts up signs saying that no one is allowed to poop on the floor.
This goes on for a while. Most of the other coworkers barely even say anything anymore when Taylor poops on the floor. The boss allowed some of the employees to start an Anti-floor-poop group, so everyone else just figures that it’s the group’s job to stop Taylor from pooping on the floor and to tell the boss to force Taylor to clean it up. Then, you get a new boss. And this boss one day says, “enough! I’m tired of this group always complaining about Taylor pooping on the floor! It’s like that’s all you do! In fact, I’m dissolving this group!” Now, everyone starts complaining about Taylor pooping on the floor, so the boss, completely missing the point, says, “I don’t care who poops on the floor! Just take care of it!”
Another coworker says, “I’ll show the boss! I’m gonna poop on the floor, too!” Lots of people rally around behind this coworker, and they all watch as this hero poops on the floor right in front of the boss. And the boss does nothing. Confused by the lack of reaction, everyone shuffles off, leaving the poop on the floor. And no one cleans up the poop either, because that defeats the purpose! So now, no one does anything about the poops on the floor, and there are more appearing. But everyone normalizes it, and just tries their best to not step in poop.
Even if more poop didn’t appear, you’ve still got at least one poop on the floor. Which is arguably more poop on the floor than any workplace should have. But it remains as a statement of that time that the boss didn’t act while watching someone poop on the floor.
End analogyMany people see the poop in my story as “the needle.” But I’m talking about the increasing inaction and subsequent apathy. I honestly welcomed California’s attempt to prove a point, and really expected this to go differently. It felt a lot like the Satanic Church acting as the separator between church and state. But the Supreme Court saying “this is fine,” frightens me. And it makes the pessimist in me think that the people working to advance fascism are using the momentum of our counterattack to further their goals.
The needle I’m looking at doesn’t swing towards Blue or Red. It goes from Direct Democracy to Full-Blown Fascism. Right now, anything that weakens equal representation and civil rights is helping push that needle towards fascism.
If you’re focusing on “Democrats can do it too,” then this is an absolute win. But if you look at Republicans and apolitical fascists using this to cry “rigged election,” and champing at the bit to explore new exploitations while we’re too busy doing an end zone dance, then this is terrifying.
There is nothing to celebrate here, and I’m not suggesting there is. This legal blatant gerrymandering bullshit is a net loss for this country and our democracy. I will always advocate against the practice. However, that is not on California, and I don’t think they’re wrong to do it in response to Texas and other states. It is a necessary evil, one that they were forced to make by fascists. The alternative is to cede even more power to the fascists until it goes too far to take it back.
I don’t want to kill a person and I certainly would never celebrate doing so. But if there were a gun to my head, or my daughter’s, if they were to try to take away my family, our freedom… I wouldn’t hesitate, and I would be right for it. I don’t think California has anything to apologize for, even if it is a sad outcome overall.
And I’m not suggesting that California owes anyone an apology. I still think it was a bold choice. I know that this wasn’t an attempt to further corruption, rather to scare the powers that be into reigning things in. But, it kinda blew up in our faces a little bit.
The Supreme Court realized our mistake and used it to advance the degradation of democracy. Which is what I was saying in my initial comment. They don’t care where the corruption comes from as long as they get to make things more corrupt.
And that is the needle moving.