Will the next decade really be bad for Dems?

[Mississippi Political Freak]

Florida is supposed to have an "independent commission" for redistricting.  I'm not sure exactly what that means, but if it means unbiased redistricting Dems are bound to pick up a few seats.  Right now Republicans control 19-6, and Florida is a near evenly split state.  In a perfect world the new delegation would be 14-13 GOP, but there are too many majority minority districts to do that.  Dems should be able to pick up at least a few seats here.

As krazen1211 has bentioned, Amendment 6 merely sets some constraints on the GOP legislature, which still draws the districts.  From the perspective of a left-leaning realist, while I wish the Dems would be more competitive for the congressional races in Florida, their geographical distributions (concentrated in Palm Beach and Broward counties, non-Hispanic parts of Miami-Dade, minority and white liberal portions of Orlando, Tampa and St. Petersburg metro areas, black and college areas of North Florida) mean that while being competitive for presidential and statewide races, they tend to be at a disadvantage on district-based races like the US House or the State Legislature, as attested by my on-going series of my proposed state legislature redistricting maps.

[Mississippi Political Freak]

Yeah, remember that the Democrats have a huge concentration problem in Florida.  The State is like a sea of Light Republicanism spotted with overwhelmingly Democratic sections.  To put it another way, I don't think its possible to draw an Obama-seat outside of Tampa/st Petersburg, Orlando, or Miami area (and maybe jacksonville if done right) without overtly partisan county splits.

You also have to remember that the Republicans are still drawing the map, just with stricter guidelines.  The Dems will probably pick up a gimme seat in Orlando, maybe FL-22, and that's about it (and Bill Young's seat when he retires maybe).  Its not like the State's 19-6 Republicans JUST because they draw the map

That's exactly echoes my assessment  on the electoral prospects of Florida's Dems.  They will be frequently competitive at Presidential and Statewide (US Senate, Governor and State Cabinet ) levels, but tend to struggle mightily on district-based races like the US House and the State Legislature, even with geographically compact and continuous seats.