Caucuses were briefed. Polls are being shared. And the push to swing California bluer is taking shape.
California’s Texas-thwarting gerrymander has swiftly transformed from fantasy to reality.
Democrats in the House and the state Legislature are coalescing around a plan to draw a half-dozen Republican incumbents into oblivion — and persuade California voters to approve the new congressional maps before next year’s midterms. Party leaders are closely tracking the dual-track developments in which lawmakers in Texas and California are moving, in partisan parallel, to shore up their respective party’s House majorities. California Republicans are casting about for a way to avoid extinction.
It all points to a high-stakes, big-dollar brawl thrusting California to the center of the political universe.
It sucks that this is where we’re at, but I’m glad California is stepping up and doing this. Republicans constantly play outside the rules to win. Democrats always try to take the high road and end up losing big.
Ultimately, meeting Republicans at the bottom is the only way to possibly see real change. Maybe eventually courts go “ok this sucks for everyone, not just for Democrats, so we have to actually fix it.” But as long as gerrymandering is more beneficial to the right, that’ll never happen.
Cheating helps the cheater until it just changes the rules for everybody.
And it’s never fun for anybody involved.
Texas-thwarting
Making California less democratic doesn’t actually thwart plans to make Texas less democratic tho? It just sets up a neolib fiefdom near the fascist fiefdom so shitty authoritarians around the country can say “look the other side is doing it so we gotta.”
You’re playing chess. But every time you glance away, your opponent steals one of your pieces off the board. Your options are:
- Keep playing by the rules, hoping your high-minded example activates your opponent’s conscience and they stop cheating.
- Recognize your opponent is a cheater who has no morals and do what you need to do to stop them from cheating.
That’s the situation we’re in at this point.
Or:
You’re playing poker with someone, but every time you get a hand that’s good, they point a gun at you.
So you’re not playing poker. You’re just being robbed.
deleted by creator
If there’s anything at all Democrats have to learn in order to win ever again it’s that “when they go low we go high” and having a moral backbone is a losing strategy. Cheating and breaking rules keeps letting the other side win and they keep making it easier for themselves, if Democrats refuse to start slinging mud then they’re just going to keep losing
“Democrats need to do anything they can to stop the fascists from winning.”
“Wait, not that.”
Sure but the moment one side doesn’t, the house will likely always be one party majority. So playing the high road, can only hurt you
Then what the fuck do you suggest?
People are desperate to stop the current regime but I agree with you. The Plan A is Texas Dems thwarting it by preventing a vote by staying out of the state, but if they then illegally arrest them then I’m not sure what Plan B can be.
However, this is only a solution if it can be used a threat to stop the gerrymandering or if it is used to push the government to regulate gerrymandering; otherwise it’ll just lead to even less pluralistic democracy which will be very hard to undo because people in power generally don’t let go that power. Unfortunately, it probably won’t stop Texas and if it does prompt regulation, we know GOP only creates rules for others that they won’t follow.
Plan C is probably a bloody uprising though so who knows.
