US: House Redistricting Massachusetts

[Dgov]

I am shocked, shocked to find out that a Republican wants a Dem vote sink in Boston.

Well, its not like any of the surrounding seats would be competitive anyway.  i think its more like "A Republican wants one of his strongest potential challengers to not get drawn out of his seat"

[krazen1211]

I am shocked, shocked to find out that a Republican wants a Dem vote sink in Boston.

Well, its not like any of the surrounding seats would be competitive anyway.  i think its more like "A Republican wants one of his strongest potential challengers to not get drawn out of his seat"

Yeah, Senators normally shut up about House redistricting. I think he's motivated by numero uno rather than any generic partisan cause.

On another note, I guess we know who won't be running against Brown.

Rep. Richard Neal tells a local television station that Browns' independence is "very impressive" and gives him a "B" grade on his tenure.


http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0411/Grading_Brown.html

[Dgov]

I am shocked, shocked to find out that a Republican wants a Dem vote sink in Boston.

Well, its not like any of the surrounding seats would be competitive anyway.  i think its more like "A Republican wants one of his strongest potential challengers to not get drawn out of his seat"

Yeah, Senators normally shut up about House redistricting. I think he's motivated by numero uno rather than any generic partisan cause.

On another note, I guess we know who won't be running against Brown.

Rep. Richard Neal tells a local television station that Browns' independence is "very impressive" and gives him a "B" grade on his tenure.


http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0411/Grading_Brown.html

Wow.  What is Brown, Liberal Politician Kryptonite?  I've never seen someone rise so much so fast.

[Former Moderate]

I am shocked, shocked to find out that a Republican wants a Dem vote sink in Boston.

The immediate Boston suburbs of Newton, Quincy, and Brookline are very, very Democratic as well. You have to go all the way out to the Worcester suburbs before taking in any real GOP territory, and by that point, you've just got way too much population included in the district.

Wow.  What is Brown, Liberal Politician Kryptonite?  I've never seen someone rise so much so fast.

Romney aside, Massachusetts politics is extremely congenial between the two parties. Republicans in the state legislature rarely see organized opposition from the state Democratic party. No Republican incumbent has lost a race for re-election in decades (though I do expect that to change in 2012 given the number of seats the GOP picked up in the House).

[Dan the Roman]

I am shocked, shocked to find out that a Republican wants a Dem vote sink in Boston.

The immediate Boston suburbs of Newton, Quincy, and Brookline are very, very Democratic as well. You have to go all the way out to the Worcester suburbs before taking in any real GOP territory, and by that point, you've just got way too much population included in the district.

Wow.  What is Brown, Liberal Politician Kryptonite?  I've never seen someone rise so much so fast.

Romney aside, Massachusetts politics is extremely congenial between the two parties. Republicans in the state legislature rarely see organized opposition from the state Democratic party. No Republican incumbent has lost a race for re-election in decades (though I do expect that to change in 2012 given the number of seats the GOP picked up in the House).

Susan Pope?

[Gravis Marketing]

The immediate Boston suburbs of Newton, Quincy, and Brookline are very, very Democratic as well. You have to go all the way out to the Worcester suburbs before taking in any real GOP territory, and by that point, you've just got way too much population included in the district.

Tom Finneran's majority-minority district in 2001 took Lynn out of the 6th and put it in the 8th. A similar move here would make the 6th more Republican, unless it took Democratic areas from the 5th, which would then make the 5th more Republican. And both of those districts have weak Dem incumbents...

Also, moving chairs around in the Boston area could move Quincy out of the 10th, which has a similar effect. Brown probably doesn't know anything about moving Lynn, but he knows he did very, very well for a Republican in traditionally Democratic areas of the 9th district and would see opportunities there for an ally.

[Gravis Marketing]

Oh, more obviously: a majority-minority seat based on the 8th would probably mean putting most of Cambridge and Somerville in the 4th with Barney Frank. That detaches Brown's home territory from a safe Democratic district and means one of his successors would have a congenial district to run in. In fact, that's exactly what Finneran's map did: create a Bristol County-based district that could go Republican. Brown is from that part of the state and so are the Republican men who succeeded him in the House and Senate.

[krazen1211]

Great piece on Massachusetts Congressional districts, and where the Republicans are, and how expertly they were split up. Credit is given where credit is due.


http://www.redracinghorses.com/diary/379/massachusetts-congressional-vote-2010

[Gravis Marketing]

Great piece on Massachusetts Congressional districts, and where the Republicans are, and how expertly they were split up. Credit is given where credit is due.


http://www.redracinghorses.com/diary/379/massachusetts-congressional-vote-2010

You're seeing the "wow, those trees vote Republican" problem we get with national county maps showing Democrats losing most of the acreage of the U.S. but winning national elections. Those red towns have a fraction of the population the blue cities have. You'd have to aggressively gerrymander and recruit strong Republican candidates to have even two Congressional districts Republicans could win.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Okay, here's a Republican district for you:

[Senator Napoleon]

How Republican?

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I have no idea, I just stitched it together from the maps on that link.

[Sibboleth]

Okay, here's a Republican district for you:

Seems fair and reasonable to me. Anyone opposed to drawing this eminently logical district is little more than a Democrat Party hack.

[Gravis Marketing]

Seems fair and reasonable to me. Anyone opposed to drawing this eminently logical district is little more than a Democrat Party hack.

LOL. You can tell how the current districts were cleverly drawn to dismantle this community of interest.

[Gravis Marketing]

How Republican?

I'm guessing it gave Obama less than 53% of the vote, and Kerry slightly more.

[Former Moderate]

How Republican?

I'm guessing it gave Obama less than 53% of the vote, and Kerry slightly more.

I presume you could get Obama down even lower. IIRC, I was able to create a Gore 52% district back when I was playing around with redistricting Massachusetts years ago. (The district I created, of course, looked almost identical to this one.)

[Dan the Roman]

How Republican?

I'm guessing it gave Obama less than 53% of the vote, and Kerry slightly more.

I presume you could get Obama down even lower. IIRC, I was able to create a Gore 52% district back when I was playing around with redistricting Massachusetts years ago. (The district I created, of course, looked almost identical to this one.)

The problem with Gore numbers is that Nader did very well in 2000, so even though Gore did marginally worse than Kerry, Bush did 4% worse in 2000 than in 2004. As a consequence the Bush percentage is a much better indicator.

Otherwise you end up with the 10th District looking a lot more Republican than it is. It does have a base, but its hard for a Republican to get over the 44% hump there.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I made a map that eliminates Niki Tsongas:



MA-05 is broken up into pieces; MA-01 gets the western side of the district, MA-06 gets Lowell and Lawrence, and MA-07 gets a chunk in between the other two parts. I tried to maintain the existing districts as much as possible; MA-07 is the most changed, but it keeps the heavily-Dem inner suburbs as a base. I also bacon-stripped the southeastern counties as much as possible, and ran MA-10 (now MA-05) into Boston to strengthen it a bit.

[Gravis Marketing]

That is a really good effort. Really good. I do think that particular solution for former MA-10 would incite thermonuclear war--it takes minority areas of Boston out of MA-8 and appends them to the most Irish-American district in the country in order to bolster Bill Keating. But you knew that. Very good.

[krazen1211]

Boston got chopped up like Austin there. I thought some redistricting chairman was from Boston?

[Gravis Marketing]

Boston got chopped up like Austin there. I thought some redistricting chairman was from Boston?

The one rep. from Boston (Lynch) still represents as much of the city as before, and the same parts. Most of MA-8's Boston portion goes to Keating's district.

[Vasall des Midas]

Just for show... I can draw the state too. This is supposed to be a makes-sense-on-the-ground, good governance map.



I think these seats - barring the yellow one, obviously - make a lot of sense while still being broadly based on the current ones (the old third abolished); I'd like to have pointers for any obvious mistakes. And for who'd probably run where in the entirely hypothetical scenario of a similar map being enacted.
Three towns split - Boston, Holyoke, I forget what north Middlesex suburb.

[Vasall des Midas]

There was talk of a minority-pack in Boston earlier. This is what the maximum pack looks like. (District's northern and southern edges in Lynn and Brockton just outside the map.)

34.7% White, 26.3% Black, 23.1% Hispanic, 9.6% Asian. 39.4% White VAP.

[Former Moderate]

Is that kind of minority pack in anyone's best interest?

[Vasall des Midas]

In this particular case... Nope. Can't think of anybody.
Oh yeah, possibly some Black state legislator with a bit of outreach beyond his core constituency, once Capuano retires.