As you may have heard, the Texas legislature is looking at redistricting. The Dems are not happy and will likely refer to Governor Abbott as a dictator. I’m sure that they will bring up that Hitler “gerrymandered” Germany. To say the least, the other side is angry and may fly out of the state again to make their point.

You may remember that the last time they tried it, some of them came back with COVID. I guess that they forgot to wear their masks or whispered too many sweet nothings during the flight.

Image by ChatGPT.

The Democrat anger is a little hypocritical. They are experts at gerrymandering, as John Hinderaker wrote:

[I]f you didn’t know better, you would think that Republicans invented gerrymandering. The Times laments the fact that in responding to the GOP’s efforts, “the toolbox for Democrats is relatively sparse, aside from litigation or legislative protests.” If you read far enough, you find out why:

States where Democrats would have complete control over any redistricting, such as Illinois and Maryland, are already gerrymandered heavily in their favor. Squeezing more Democratic seats out of those states would be a challenge.

Indeed.

Illinois’s congressional delegation has a 14-to-3 Democratic advantage. Maryland’s is seven Democrats to one Republican. Both states would have to eliminate every Republican district to come close to offsetting the potential Texas changes.

So Illinois’ House delegation is 82% Democrat, while the presidential vote in 2024 split 54% Democrat and 43% Republican. Maryland’s House delegation is 88% Democrat, while the presidential vote in 2024 was 63% Democrat and 34% Republican.

Somehow, it is hard to work up a lot of sympathy for the Democrats.

Yes, it’s hard to feel sympathy for hypocrites. In other words, the people who mastered gerrymandering don’t like to be gerrymandered.

The larger issue is that Democrats are not growing in state legislatures. It’s hard to gerrymander when you are the minority party. Sorry, but that’s life, no matter how difficult it may be.

So we will hear a lot about the will of the people. What you are really hearing is that the GOP has many more votes and the Democrats don’t.

So, thanks for gerrymandering your states, and we’ll do the same.

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