The hardest thing for me to remember when making GOP friendly gerrymanders is that a 50% John MctCain district isn’t a toss-up but a likely R district, similar in theory to a 60% Obama District. 5 points more friendly to the gop then the nation as an average implies that, but it is somewhat tricky for me, at least, to wrap my mind around it. However, that was my goal when I started North Carolina: create as many districts that went GOP in 08 as possible. After getting an 11-2 in a state that went for Obama, i figured a 36-0 in Texas was possible. and it was. One district voted for Obama by less than 1000 votes, so I’m going to count it. A 59% Obama district would be okay for most of us here… Without further ado, MAPS!
As always, ask me and i will provide a zoomed in map of whatever area you wish if it isn’t clear from the big one.
http://img.photobucket.com/alb…
http://img.photobucket.com/alb…
El Paso: http://img.photobucket.com/alb…
District 1 (Blue): Mccain 56%, 56% Hispanic
El Paso and Odessa
District 2 (Green): M 53%, 63% H
Rest of El Paso and some nearby counties
San Antonio and Austin: http://img.photobucket.com/alb…
District 3 (Purple): M 50%, 60% H
South San Antonio
District 4 (Red): M 51%, 50% H
North and West Antonio
District 5 (Yellow): M 51%, 40% H, 10% Black, 3% Asian
East and North San Antonio
District 6 (Teal): M 50%, 72% H
Laredo and some Border counties, then up to West Texas
District 7 (Gray): M 50%, 66% H
McAllen and Border areas all the way up to Bastrop and Fayette Counties
District 8(Violet) M 51%, 62% H
Brownsville, Mcallen and then up.
District 9(Sky Blue): M 51%, 59% H
Brownsville, Harlingen, up to Williamson and Milam counties.
District 10 (Pink): M 50%, 35% H, 16% B, 3% A
Corpus Christi and up
Houston: http://img.photobucket.com/alb…
District 11 (Lemon-Lime Green): M 55%, 55% White
South of Houston
District 12 (Blue-Line Green) : M 56%, 22% H, 20% H, 11% A
Some of the south-west of Houston and then surroundin areas.
District 13(Light Brown): M 53%, W 52%
Houston and some areas north
District 14(Gold): M 57%, W 61%
Houston and some areas north
District 15 (Orange): M 52%, 32% H, 19% B, 4% A
South of Houston, with a bit of the city
District 16(Lime Green): M 52%, 39% H, 12% B, 4% A
Houston and Areas East
District 17(Navy blue): M 52%, 41% H, 16% B
Houston and Areas North East
District 18 (Golden Yellow): M 56%, 56% W
North of Houston
District 19 (Puke Green): M 56%, 65% W
Wraps around 11-17
District 20 (Light Pink): M 52%, 59% W
Wraps around Austin and takes part of the city then to Abilene
District 21 (Blood Red): M 54%, 66% W
Parts of Austin then going to sparsely populated Northern Texas
District 22 (Poo Brown): M 51%, 79% W
Austin and North Texas
Dallas-FW: http://img.photobucket.com/alb…
District 23 (Robin’s Egg Blue): M 54%, 57% W
Dallas and some northern suburbs
District 24 (Dark Purple): M 56%, 59% W
Dallas and Some Eastern areas
District 25 (Rose): M 54%, 59% W
Dallas then to some less populated eastern areas
District 26 (Silver) M 58%, 54% W
Dallas, FW, then to North Texas
District 27 (Sea Green) M 49%, 54% W
Dallas, FW, then to North Texas
District 28 (Pinkish Purple) M 60%, 57% W
Irving, then up to North Texas
District 29 (Gray Green): M 53%, 60% W
Waco and Forth Worth
District 30 (slightly lighter shade of rose then
the one touching it): M 55%, 60% W
Parts of Arlington, Dallas and Fort Worth
District 31 (Tan): M 61%, 71% W
North Fort Worth and Dallas then North
District 32 (Red Orange): M 64%, 79% W
North FW and then northern areas surrounding it
District 33 (I can’t name that many different shades of blue): M 63%, 80% W
North of Dallas
District 34 (Somewhat dark-green): M 69%, 75% W
Wraps around a lot of other districts, filling in a lot of gaps
District 35 (Royal Purple): M 62%, 64% W
Everything Else Part 1
District 36 (Not Flyers Orange, but I’m using it anyways): M 68%, 69% W
Everything Else, Part 2
This is not a perfect 36-0 Map. The last 5-6 districts could bleed some republican voters to some of the more borderline districts. However, in an ok to good year, the republicans win all 36 seats barring an exceptional democratic candidate.
Dave’s seems to have deleted my other maps. I’ll redo them later and either edit this diary or do a new one, depending on what you guys thing.
And that Republicans probably won’t be stupid enough to try and baconmander Austin (though it might be a good thing if they try, actually, because we could bank a two or three districts out of that folly).
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Where url is location of your image (ie. http://img.photobucket.com/alb… )
It would be huge backfire though, because Democrats could take a good number of these seats in a good year.
now the real trick is doing a 36-0 Texas map for the Dems 🙂 lol
Would be to make three safe D seats, one in Dallas, one in Houston and one in Austin and pack them in the the remaining GOP vote can be used to strengthen some of the weaker distrists. A 33-3 map could be feasible.
would be to produce a set of maps like this: ridiculous gerrymanders, in each direction, of a bunch of large states. The point being that if the simple act of drawing the lines can produce a swing between Texas 24D-12R and Texas 0D-36R, then maybe drawing the lines is too powerful an act to continue to ignore.
The only reform I’d support would be a nationwide set of laws governing reapportionment, along the lines of the Voting Rights Act but much more broadly developed, or a constitutional amendment adopting same.
If it were the constitutional amendment route, I’d love to see a further reform tacked on such that most EVs were distributed to the winner of each congressional district, with only the two statewide EVs going to the winner of the state. That would radically reduce the “swing state” phenomenon whereby some communities — Black Belt of the South, Central Valley of CA, upstate NY — are completely ignored, while other communities in states that happen to be evenly divided are saturated in political attention. Doing EVs by Congressional District would focus presidential politics on those CDs that happen to be more narrowly divided, but those would fall in a much wider geographic spread than do the “swing states.” However, the districts would have to be reasonably fairly drawn, or else the presidential race would fall victim to the gerrymander, which would be a catastrophe. Hence the need for a constitutional amendment concerning districting for this change to be beneficial.
Anyway, the point is that these maps help demonstrate just how powerful the power of districting is. They could be a compelling part of a reformer’s argument, ironically enough.
I don’t think this would be the best plan for the gop. I would go 32-4, with Austin, Dallas, Houston and South Texas. I just wanted to do it for the sake of doing it.
As for images: I have text to image and i forget that people don’t have it sometimes. My apologies, although I think everyone should get text to image asap!
Or more likely, the only thing in the way of something like 32-4. It’s very likely that every Democratic seat in Texas after the next drawing will be majority-minority, and of those, only the Austin seat will be plurality-white.
great cracking of the cities there.
I’m kinda curious to see a 53-0 map of California now. Ya know, just for shits and giggles.
Quick question for someone just starting to fiddle with these maps. Once a map is created and districts drawn, how does one view the Obama-McCain margins?
Currently, the appear at 0%-0% in all the districts I’ve drawn in each map I’ve attempted (AZ, AR and LA); however, I can see the racial make up of each, which, sadly, in the case of a state like LA, is essentially the presidential margin…
is saving the GOP if they thought they could get away with this because it would be a disaster.
And I hope this can help to the people for understand what they will not leave to the democrats in Texas more than the VRA tell. I’m sure the republicans from Texas think they are conceding enough to the democrats respecting the VRA rules.
Currently TX-16 (El Paso) is D+10 with 80.9% hispanic population.
The TX-01 of this map is aproximately R+9 with 56% hispanic population.
The VRA would accept the current TX-16 becomes in a district like the TX-01 of this map?
This is the most important question for the redistricting process in Texas.
If the VRA accept this, TX-16, TX-29, TX-20, TX-15, TX-28 (plus TX-27 and TX-23) can become R+5+ districts. That can leave only TX-09, TX-18 and TX-30 as D+ districts in Texas.
But still bid this, this time is very dangerous for the republicans, because they can create new VRA districts easily what can run, while they fail in the court making more republican these districts like TX-16. Then, I keep my preview about the redistricting for Texas.