US House Redistricting: New York

[Brittain33]

Is his voting record markedly different from that of, say, Spencer Bachus or John Fleming on anything significant?

He's a member of the Main Street Partnership... I also vaguely remember he and Rep. Hanna not siding with most Republicans on a couple of votes, though I can't recall which. He's definitely not a Buerkle. (And his MoV in 2010 was nearly 10%.)

correct, Gibson is a good fit for this district. Remember, this is a district who used to elect wingnut Gerald B.H. Solomon every two years.

That was the district--it's gotten more Democratic with the remap. Also, the national party has gone way to the right and exerts much more discipline than in the past on its foot soldiers.

[Brittain33]

Color me surprised, again, that Owens and Bishop survived the tsunami of 2010 given these stats.

Lowey and Tonko are not losing to Republicans in this decade absent a scandal.

[Brittain33]

I wonder if Hochul might try to primary Slaughter. As you can see, in her current district is a pretty good chunk of western and southwestern Monroe County which has been moved into Slaughter's CD.

She's from the Buffalo area, so likely not. Pelosi will see that she lands somewhere comfy in Obama's administration, I guess.

[Brittain33]

The Orthodox Jews in her district will be easy enough to please and won't swing against her on an anti-Obama vote the way that garden variety grumpy old Jews in Florida swung against him. She's an incumbent and she will very easily be able to nail down their vote. I don't see any evidence for the rest of the assessment of her weakness.

[Brittain33]

[with more potential for an even larger one embedded (but not reflected in the 2008 voting stats), in the orthodox Jewish vote

Uh... what?

The appropriate inference to draw from the text is that I assume that  there is a potential for there being a cohort of orthodox Jews, along with some other Jews perhaps, who voted for Obama last time, who won't this time in disproportionate numbers, such that with this cohort, it will not only swing to the GOP, but also trend that way.  This, despite Lowey being Jewish herself. Thank you.

Looking at FL-22 and NY-9 data from 2000 through 2004 through 2008, it appears that group already trended that way once. I don't know how much further they have to trend (given that everyone expects Obama to underperform 2008 anyway) and, more, importantly, if they're going to take it out on the senior Jewish lady (born: 1937) who is their representative and meets with them individually.

Recall that if Hillary hadn't run in 2000, Lowey was the front-runner to succeed Pat Moynihan. Nebbishes and people who are legends in their own mind only don't generally get plum nominations like that.

[Brittain33]

Stop being a prick, Bob.

Very good call.

[Brittain33]

Down south, Lowey's new CD has agitated the Pubs out of their slumber perhaps.

Carvin sounds like a vanity candidate.

[Brittain33]

Ok, I was wrong in thinking that restoring Slaughter's district to Monroe only was painless for Dems. Too many Dems disagree.

[Brittain33]

A good Republican year?  If Obama wins, I doubt it will be a good Republican year. 

Yeah... I'm assuming either evenly balanced or slightly Dem year, which means some Republican losses but continued control of the House.

[Brittain33]

How do you think it will change now that they've created a commission to do it?

I think it could help the GOP, since the Dems won't be able to gerrymander anymore.

When did the Dems gerrymander New York other than the state assembly? Not in 2012 or in 2002, certainly.