Krugman: Electoral Math & Gerrymandering aids Republican candidates.... but a SURGE of voters could overwhelm the dikes...
Ah, the great Paul Krugman. We point out yet again that the New York Times has only TWO competent op-ed (editorialist) commentators, Frank Rich and Paul Krugman. The rest are shills for the "White-Men-Rule-through-Deceit-&-Treachery" school of 'journalism,' including Maureen Dowd and Bob Herbert, the Times editorial board's token woman and Black (African-American) commentators, respectively.
Once again, Dowd, in her own confessional op-ed, has written that she KNEW that George W. Bush was "playing the clown" in all of his 2000 campaign flights and bus trips (with all the hallmarks of Bush clowning we have so come to know, including derisive, put-down nicknames and a tendency not to give straight answers to simple questions, etc.).... yet DOWD decided NOT TO MENTION Bush's derisive clowning in her summer of 2000 op-eds, INSTEAD FOCUSING on Al Gore's "earth tone wardrobes" and other alleged faux pas; and Clinton's alleged obsession with "legacy"... as if the Palestinian-Israel conflict was no more than a footnote to the Clinton White House years! For his part, BOB HERBERT was either too stupid, or too corrupted (taken in with himself) to notice that DISENFRANCHISEMENT of Black (African-American) voters was a CORE STRATEGY of the Bush Republicans in 2000, a massive miscalculation or betrayal that allowed Herbert to jump on the Maureen Dowd/DC press corps sniping and snide bashing of Gore and Clinton in 2000" bandwagon while IGNORING the ruthless tactics the Republicans used to minimize minority voter representation. (Including the hypocrisy of using "MORAL VALUES" as the bedrock of the Clinton Impeachment, while Denny Hastert was the ONLY Repub the GOP leadership could find who DIDN'T HAVE AN ONGOING AFFAIR at the time!)
WELL, the great Paul Krugman rectifies Bob Herbert's incredibly dense FAILURE to address Gerrymandering, intimidation, tossed registrations, massive purge lists, and other illegal means as a CORE TACTIC of Republican DISENFRANCHISEMENT of Black voters.
<< The key point is that African-Americans, who overwhelmingly vote Democratic, are highly concentrated in a few districts. This means that in close elections many Democratic votes are, as political analysts say, wasted -- they simply add to huge majorities in a small number of districts, while the more widely spread Republican vote allows the G.O.P. to win by narrower margins in a larger number of districts. >>
God Bless Krugman for stating the obvious, for as we here at C-dems.blgspt.com have been writing for months now, a SIGNATURE ELEMENT of the BREAKDOWN of the Democratic Majority has been the SWITCH of neo-con, AIPAC Democrats FROM Civil Rights and an alliance with Black voters and the Democratic Party, TO an alliance with the neo-con, neo-imperial, neo-theocratic agenda of the Bush Republican Radical Right agenda.
This trend is of course evidenced for all eternity in THE REFUSAL of EVERY Democratic Senator (led by JOE LIEBERMAN and including the AIPAC senators such as Schumer, Feinstein, and even liberals Boxer and Feingold) to SIGN ON TO THE Black Congressional Caucus' demands for a Congressional investigation into vote fraud in Florida in 2000. To emphasize again, in his early career JOE LIEBERMAN aligned with Civil Rights and Freedom marchers. Now that he has attained the highest levels of influence (and comfortable wealth) in America, Lieberman is THE STAUNCHEST SUPPORTER of illegal government spying, summary arrest powers, torture, indefinite detentions, and other dictatorial rights-crushing policies in the entire US Congress... the complete, 100%, 180ยบ, diametrical OPPOSITE of where he stood in his early, up-and-coming career.
(Phew!) So Krugman IS THE EXCEPTION, in both in Congress and the media, to those who IGNORE the STRUCTURAL DISENFRANCHISEMENT of huge chunks of the voting population, a chronic under-representation built into the system that is ignored by everyone, press, media, and government, including the DLC Dems. A trend that has been built into the system for over a hundred years, as the Washington Post's beloved cartoonist Herblock illustrated with his "Rural votes are worth 100 urban votes" cartoons from the late 1960s.
But what is more important is what Krugman alludes to in his column (and we apologize for taking 6 paragraphs to get to the 'most important part'; writing that violates the journalistic tenet of "putting what is important first"):
AS KRUGMAN POINTS OUT, the entire national electorate is inherently biased TOWARDS those programs and policies that have been built up over 150 years (for over 200 years if you take the Declaration of Independence and colonial American freedoms as a starting point), policies and governance FOR DEMOCRATIZATION, citizen empowerment, and FOR economic and political ENFRANCHISEMENT.
The heart-and-soul of Republican electioneering is TO GET THE MAJORITY OF VOTERS to vote FOR policies that REWARD ONLY the top 2% of the population! As in, government labor and manufacturing policies that use TAXPAYER SUBSIDIES to EXPORT ("outsource") American jobs overseas... a policy that ONLY rewards those at the top of a company's ownership who benefit from dismantling American factories for profits from cheaper wages overseas.
As in, tax-cuts for the hyper-wealthy, that blue-collar and white-collar Americans must not only make up for, but must pay INTEREST ON THE DEBT as well!
As in, Republicans shouting "TORT REFORM!" and "ABUSE of the legal system enables frivolous lawsuits" WHEN THE REPUBLICANS THEMSELVES use SIMILAR SUITS to hamstring their opposition at EVERY opportunity, including an ongoing lawsuit against Dem. Representative Jim McDermott by Republican leadership! (http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=34045)
As in, Republicans courting the Radical Right 'fundamentalist' movement, which seeks to not only CRIMINALIZE abortion, contraception, and female reproductive rights... BUT TO OUTLAW the teaching of EVOLUTION in public schools as well!
One financial commentator ("Mad Money" with Jim Cramer?) noted recently, American colleges and universities will be graduating 100,000 engineers this year... while CHINA is graduating ONE MILLION engineers! In a world where economic and financial competition has gone global, instantaneous, and hyper-competitive, REPUBLICANS are PERFECTLY WILLING to SELL OUT PUBLIC EDUCATION in a myriad of ways - in a callous attempt to woo right-wing voters and gain political power - and the Democrats have NO EFFECTIVE ANSWER to this blockhead arrogance and stupidity!
The bottom line is, since at least 9-11, if not long before the end of the Clinton administration, the BREAKDOWN of the traditional Democratic Alliance (a REJECTION of populist themes and Civil Rights emphasis, in favor of DEFERENCE to the Radical Right agenda and wooing of corporate America and the wealthy) has been ongoing for years.
Democrats have NOT been LEADERS, but instead have been swept along by Republican electioneering and right-wing propaganda, like a cork down a whitewater river. For example, ALLOWING union-basher RUPERT MURDOCH's Fox "news" to CLAIM "FAIR AND BALANCED" - as they SHUT OUT Democratic and liberal advocates THREE TO ONE on Fox 'news' shows!
<< No. Bear in mind that the G.O.P. isn't in trouble because of a string of bad luck. The problems that have caused Americans to turn on the party, from the disaster in Iraq to the botched response to Katrina, from the failed attempt to privatize Social Security to the sudden realization by many voters that THE SELF-PROCLAIMED CHAMPIONS of MORAL VALUES are HYPOCRITES.... are DEEPLY ROOTED in the WHOLE NATURE OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNANCE. So even if this surge doesn't overtook the levee, there will be another surge soon. >>
==================================================
Will the Levee Break?
by Paul Krugman
NY Times Oct. 15, 2006
The conventional wisdom says that the Democrats will take control of the House of Representatives next month, but only by a small margin. I've been looking at the numbers, however, and I believe this conventional wisdom is almost all wrong.
Here's what's happening: a huge Democratic storm surge is heading toward a high Republican levee. It's still possible that the surge won't overtop the levee -- that is, the Democrats could fail by a small margin to take control of Congress. But if the surge does go over the top, the flooding will almost surely reach well inland -- that is, if the Democrats win, they'll probably win big.
Let's talk about Congressional arithmetic.
Unless the Bush administration is keeping Osama bin Laden in a freezer somewhere, a majority of Americans will vote Democratic this year. If Congressional seats were allocated in proportion to popular votes, a Democratic House would be a done deal. But they aren't, and the way our electoral system works, combined with the way ethnic groups are distributed, still gives the Republicans some hope of holding on.
The key point is that African-Americans, who overwhelmingly vote Democratic, are highly concentrated in a few districts. This means that in close elections many Democratic votes are, as political analysts say, wasted -- they simply add to huge majorities in a small number of districts, while the more widely spread Republican vote allows the G.O.P. to win by narrower margins in a larger number of districts.
My back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that because of this "geographic gerrymander," even a substantial turnaround in total Congressional votes -- say, from the three-percentage-point Republican lead in 2004 to a five-point Democratic lead this year -- would leave the House narrowly in Republican hands. It looks as if the Democrats need as much as a seven-point lead in the overall vote to take control.
No wonder, then, that until a few months ago many political analysts argued that the Republicans would control the House for the foreseeable future, because only a perfect political storm could overcome the G.O.P. structural advantage.
But what's that howling sound? Every poll taken this month shows the Democrats with a double-digit lead in the generic ballot question, in which voters are asked which party they support in this election. The median Democratic lead is 14 points.
And here's the thing: because there are many districts that the G.O.P. carried by only moderately large margins in recent elections, a large Democratic surge -- one only a bit bigger than that needed to take the House at all -- would sweep away many Republicans holding seats normally considered safe. If the actual vote is anything like what the polls now suggest, we're talking about the Democrats holding a larger majority in the House than the Republicans have held at any point since their 1994 takeover.
So if the Democrats win, they'll probably have a substantial majority. Whether they'll be able to keep that majority is another question. But be prepared to wake up less than four weeks from now and learn that everything you've been told about American politics -- liberalism is dead, whoever controls the South controls Washington, only Republicans know "the way to win" -- is wrong. (Are we seeing the birth of a new New Deal coalition, in which the solid Northeast takes the place of the solid South?)
The storm may yet weaken. The Iowa Electronic Markets, in which people bet real money on election outcomes, still give Republicans a roughly 40 percent chance of keeping control of both houses of Congress. If that happens, will it mean that Republican control is permanent after all?
No. Bear in mind that the G.O.P. isn't in trouble because of a string of bad luck. The problems that have caused Americans to turn on the party, from the disaster in Iraq to the botched response to Katrina, from the failed attempt to privatize Social Security to the sudden realization by many voters that the self-proclaimed champions of moral values are hypocrites, are deeply rooted in the whole nature of Republican governance. So even if this surge doesn't overtop the levee, there will be another surge soon.
But the best guess is that the permanent Republican majority will end in a little over three weeks.
Once again, Dowd, in her own confessional op-ed, has written that she KNEW that George W. Bush was "playing the clown" in all of his 2000 campaign flights and bus trips (with all the hallmarks of Bush clowning we have so come to know, including derisive, put-down nicknames and a tendency not to give straight answers to simple questions, etc.).... yet DOWD decided NOT TO MENTION Bush's derisive clowning in her summer of 2000 op-eds, INSTEAD FOCUSING on Al Gore's "earth tone wardrobes" and other alleged faux pas; and Clinton's alleged obsession with "legacy"... as if the Palestinian-Israel conflict was no more than a footnote to the Clinton White House years! For his part, BOB HERBERT was either too stupid, or too corrupted (taken in with himself) to notice that DISENFRANCHISEMENT of Black (African-American) voters was a CORE STRATEGY of the Bush Republicans in 2000, a massive miscalculation or betrayal that allowed Herbert to jump on the Maureen Dowd/DC press corps sniping and snide bashing of Gore and Clinton in 2000" bandwagon while IGNORING the ruthless tactics the Republicans used to minimize minority voter representation. (Including the hypocrisy of using "MORAL VALUES" as the bedrock of the Clinton Impeachment, while Denny Hastert was the ONLY Repub the GOP leadership could find who DIDN'T HAVE AN ONGOING AFFAIR at the time!)
WELL, the great Paul Krugman rectifies Bob Herbert's incredibly dense FAILURE to address Gerrymandering, intimidation, tossed registrations, massive purge lists, and other illegal means as a CORE TACTIC of Republican DISENFRANCHISEMENT of Black voters.
<< The key point is that African-Americans, who overwhelmingly vote Democratic, are highly concentrated in a few districts. This means that in close elections many Democratic votes are, as political analysts say, wasted -- they simply add to huge majorities in a small number of districts, while the more widely spread Republican vote allows the G.O.P. to win by narrower margins in a larger number of districts. >>
God Bless Krugman for stating the obvious, for as we here at C-dems.blgspt.com have been writing for months now, a SIGNATURE ELEMENT of the BREAKDOWN of the Democratic Majority has been the SWITCH of neo-con, AIPAC Democrats FROM Civil Rights and an alliance with Black voters and the Democratic Party, TO an alliance with the neo-con, neo-imperial, neo-theocratic agenda of the Bush Republican Radical Right agenda.
This trend is of course evidenced for all eternity in THE REFUSAL of EVERY Democratic Senator (led by JOE LIEBERMAN and including the AIPAC senators such as Schumer, Feinstein, and even liberals Boxer and Feingold) to SIGN ON TO THE Black Congressional Caucus' demands for a Congressional investigation into vote fraud in Florida in 2000. To emphasize again, in his early career JOE LIEBERMAN aligned with Civil Rights and Freedom marchers. Now that he has attained the highest levels of influence (and comfortable wealth) in America, Lieberman is THE STAUNCHEST SUPPORTER of illegal government spying, summary arrest powers, torture, indefinite detentions, and other dictatorial rights-crushing policies in the entire US Congress... the complete, 100%, 180ยบ, diametrical OPPOSITE of where he stood in his early, up-and-coming career.
(Phew!) So Krugman IS THE EXCEPTION, in both in Congress and the media, to those who IGNORE the STRUCTURAL DISENFRANCHISEMENT of huge chunks of the voting population, a chronic under-representation built into the system that is ignored by everyone, press, media, and government, including the DLC Dems. A trend that has been built into the system for over a hundred years, as the Washington Post's beloved cartoonist Herblock illustrated with his "Rural votes are worth 100 urban votes" cartoons from the late 1960s.
But what is more important is what Krugman alludes to in his column (and we apologize for taking 6 paragraphs to get to the 'most important part'; writing that violates the journalistic tenet of "putting what is important first"):
AS KRUGMAN POINTS OUT, the entire national electorate is inherently biased TOWARDS those programs and policies that have been built up over 150 years (for over 200 years if you take the Declaration of Independence and colonial American freedoms as a starting point), policies and governance FOR DEMOCRATIZATION, citizen empowerment, and FOR economic and political ENFRANCHISEMENT.
The heart-and-soul of Republican electioneering is TO GET THE MAJORITY OF VOTERS to vote FOR policies that REWARD ONLY the top 2% of the population! As in, government labor and manufacturing policies that use TAXPAYER SUBSIDIES to EXPORT ("outsource") American jobs overseas... a policy that ONLY rewards those at the top of a company's ownership who benefit from dismantling American factories for profits from cheaper wages overseas.
As in, tax-cuts for the hyper-wealthy, that blue-collar and white-collar Americans must not only make up for, but must pay INTEREST ON THE DEBT as well!
As in, Republicans shouting "TORT REFORM!" and "ABUSE of the legal system enables frivolous lawsuits" WHEN THE REPUBLICANS THEMSELVES use SIMILAR SUITS to hamstring their opposition at EVERY opportunity, including an ongoing lawsuit against Dem. Representative Jim McDermott by Republican leadership! (http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=34045)
As in, Republicans courting the Radical Right 'fundamentalist' movement, which seeks to not only CRIMINALIZE abortion, contraception, and female reproductive rights... BUT TO OUTLAW the teaching of EVOLUTION in public schools as well!
One financial commentator ("Mad Money" with Jim Cramer?) noted recently, American colleges and universities will be graduating 100,000 engineers this year... while CHINA is graduating ONE MILLION engineers! In a world where economic and financial competition has gone global, instantaneous, and hyper-competitive, REPUBLICANS are PERFECTLY WILLING to SELL OUT PUBLIC EDUCATION in a myriad of ways - in a callous attempt to woo right-wing voters and gain political power - and the Democrats have NO EFFECTIVE ANSWER to this blockhead arrogance and stupidity!
The bottom line is, since at least 9-11, if not long before the end of the Clinton administration, the BREAKDOWN of the traditional Democratic Alliance (a REJECTION of populist themes and Civil Rights emphasis, in favor of DEFERENCE to the Radical Right agenda and wooing of corporate America and the wealthy) has been ongoing for years.
Democrats have NOT been LEADERS, but instead have been swept along by Republican electioneering and right-wing propaganda, like a cork down a whitewater river. For example, ALLOWING union-basher RUPERT MURDOCH's Fox "news" to CLAIM "FAIR AND BALANCED" - as they SHUT OUT Democratic and liberal advocates THREE TO ONE on Fox 'news' shows!
<< No. Bear in mind that the G.O.P. isn't in trouble because of a string of bad luck. The problems that have caused Americans to turn on the party, from the disaster in Iraq to the botched response to Katrina, from the failed attempt to privatize Social Security to the sudden realization by many voters that THE SELF-PROCLAIMED CHAMPIONS of MORAL VALUES are HYPOCRITES.... are DEEPLY ROOTED in the WHOLE NATURE OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNANCE. So even if this surge doesn't overtook the levee, there will be another surge soon. >>
==================================================
Will the Levee Break?
by Paul Krugman
NY Times Oct. 15, 2006
The conventional wisdom says that the Democrats will take control of the House of Representatives next month, but only by a small margin. I've been looking at the numbers, however, and I believe this conventional wisdom is almost all wrong.
Here's what's happening: a huge Democratic storm surge is heading toward a high Republican levee. It's still possible that the surge won't overtop the levee -- that is, the Democrats could fail by a small margin to take control of Congress. But if the surge does go over the top, the flooding will almost surely reach well inland -- that is, if the Democrats win, they'll probably win big.
Let's talk about Congressional arithmetic.
Unless the Bush administration is keeping Osama bin Laden in a freezer somewhere, a majority of Americans will vote Democratic this year. If Congressional seats were allocated in proportion to popular votes, a Democratic House would be a done deal. But they aren't, and the way our electoral system works, combined with the way ethnic groups are distributed, still gives the Republicans some hope of holding on.
The key point is that African-Americans, who overwhelmingly vote Democratic, are highly concentrated in a few districts. This means that in close elections many Democratic votes are, as political analysts say, wasted -- they simply add to huge majorities in a small number of districts, while the more widely spread Republican vote allows the G.O.P. to win by narrower margins in a larger number of districts.
My back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that because of this "geographic gerrymander," even a substantial turnaround in total Congressional votes -- say, from the three-percentage-point Republican lead in 2004 to a five-point Democratic lead this year -- would leave the House narrowly in Republican hands. It looks as if the Democrats need as much as a seven-point lead in the overall vote to take control.
No wonder, then, that until a few months ago many political analysts argued that the Republicans would control the House for the foreseeable future, because only a perfect political storm could overcome the G.O.P. structural advantage.
But what's that howling sound? Every poll taken this month shows the Democrats with a double-digit lead in the generic ballot question, in which voters are asked which party they support in this election. The median Democratic lead is 14 points.
And here's the thing: because there are many districts that the G.O.P. carried by only moderately large margins in recent elections, a large Democratic surge -- one only a bit bigger than that needed to take the House at all -- would sweep away many Republicans holding seats normally considered safe. If the actual vote is anything like what the polls now suggest, we're talking about the Democrats holding a larger majority in the House than the Republicans have held at any point since their 1994 takeover.
So if the Democrats win, they'll probably have a substantial majority. Whether they'll be able to keep that majority is another question. But be prepared to wake up less than four weeks from now and learn that everything you've been told about American politics -- liberalism is dead, whoever controls the South controls Washington, only Republicans know "the way to win" -- is wrong. (Are we seeing the birth of a new New Deal coalition, in which the solid Northeast takes the place of the solid South?)
The storm may yet weaken. The Iowa Electronic Markets, in which people bet real money on election outcomes, still give Republicans a roughly 40 percent chance of keeping control of both houses of Congress. If that happens, will it mean that Republican control is permanent after all?
No. Bear in mind that the G.O.P. isn't in trouble because of a string of bad luck. The problems that have caused Americans to turn on the party, from the disaster in Iraq to the botched response to Katrina, from the failed attempt to privatize Social Security to the sudden realization by many voters that the self-proclaimed champions of moral values are hypocrites, are deeply rooted in the whole nature of Republican governance. So even if this surge doesn't overtop the levee, there will be another surge soon.
But the best guess is that the permanent Republican majority will end in a little over three weeks.
posted by verifi at 8:34 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home