Help needed for 2012 National Congressional Map

[Antonio the Sixth]

Florida added

Man this is so ugly... Something must be done for gerrymandering, and soon.

[Miles]

Man this is so ugly... Something must be done for gerrymandering, and soon.

Amen.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Good luck getting it in NC, neither party wants to rain on the parade because they want the ability to get revenge against the other 10 years from now. Same old story. And it takes Legislative passage to start a Consitutional amendment, so one of the parties would have to be on board.

[Fuzzybigfoot]

I took a stab at the Florida congressional races:

[Miles]

Good. The thing that frustrates me about FL is that there are a lot of marginal districts but most of them are either held by entrenched GOP incumbents (e.g, Bill Young, Ros-Lethenin) or more strongly Republican on the state level.

I think I'd put Riviera as a tossup at least...he's an awful incumbent in a 50% Obama district.

[minionofmidas]

The new Orlando seat and the seat West ran from should be lean D.

Just noticed MO-2. Should be lean R.

[Fuzzybigfoot]

The new Orlando seat and the seat West ran from should be lean D.

Just noticed MO-2. Should be lean R.

        Both of those Florida districts were tough calls.  Orlando was very close during 2004, but went for Obama by almost 20 percentage points.   I'm not sure that the presidential results can be trusted to make an accurate prediction on how the district leans, seeing as though the most recent results could have been more of a fluke (maybe  ). 
       
        Another factor is that neither of the candidates running in the genreal will be an incumbent, thus they're less known and can run from the party label and capitalize on voter ignorance (to an extent). 
       
        The final factor I can think of is Alan Greyson.  If he wins the primary, he could have some trouble cleaning his name from his last run to win the general this time around. 




         As for Allen West's district, it still contains a bunch of the Republican areas along the shores of greater Miami, so I think it could go either way. 

     

[Fuzzybigfoot]

Good. The thing that frustrates me about FL is that there are a lot of marginal districts but most of them are either held by entrenched GOP incumbents (e.g, Bill Young, Ros-Lethenin) or more strongly Republican on the state level.

I think I'd put Riviera as a tossup at least...he's an awful incumbent in a 50% Obama district.

Thanks, I'll get on it.

[I'm JewCon in name only.]

Good, I hope Rivera loses badly. He stinks of massive corruption, and sleaziness.

[Miles]

I drew the special master's map of New York. It may change, but I'm at least using it for my timeline. Obviously, there was only so much I could to accurately draw the NYC districts.

[Fuzzybigfoot]

[Miles]

Good job.

I may alter the color scheme a bit. The one I'm using for my precinct-level maps is a 5% scale too, so I may switch over to that one for this map.

...it just kinda bugs me to have pink on the map for the D>40% districts.

[Miles]

'Looks very good!

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Those NC and FL Democratic vote sinks look pretty ridiculous.

[Miles]

DKE has TX numbers posted!

[Fuzzybigfoot]

DKE has TX numbers posted!

[Yelnoc]

Those NC and FL Democratic vote sinks look pretty ridiculous.

Inexcusable gerrymandering.  Whoever drew those districts will be guillotined when the revolution comes.

[tpfkaw]

Those NC and FL Democratic vote sinks look pretty ridiculous.

FL was drawn by a non-partisan commission, IIRC.  Blame the VRA.

[Vazdul (Formerly Chairman of the Communist Party of Ontario)]

Those NC and FL Democratic vote sinks look pretty ridiculous.

FL was drawn by a non-partisan commission, IIRC.  Blame the VRA.

No, the state legislature drew the map. It's just that now there is a state constitutional amendment imposing stricter rules on the process. Fat lot of good that did.

[greenforest32]

Do we have national numbers yet for the likely (or PVI) seat distributions?

Seems like Republicans are going to have a higher floor in 2010 redistricting than 2000 with these maps.

[Miles]

Do we have national numbers yet for the likely (or PVI) seat distributions?

I estimated the national totals a while ago and had Obama winning about 225-230 CDs, down from 242 under the old lines.

[greenforest32]

Do we have national numbers yet for the likely (or PVI) seat distributions?

I estimated the national totals a while ago and had Obama winning about 225-230 CDs, down from 242 under the old lines.

Interesting. I'm also kind of surprised by what looks like a majority of geographically large districts in New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Nevada being red. No other states (maybe Illinois) seem to have that given the current rural and suburban voting distributions. Due to Republican control of redistricting?

[Joe Republic]

I'm also kind of surprised by what looks like a majority of geographically large districts in New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Nevada being red.

The large central district in Nevada (the new 4th district) is dominated by the heavily black/Hispanic and generally economically deprived North Las Vegas.  The northern district (the 2nd) is of course based in Reno.  Obama's margins in those two cities were large enough to turn both of these huge districts red simply because the desert areas are just that unpopulated.

[jimrtex]

FL was drawn by a non-partisan commission, IIRC.  Blame the VRA.

No, the state legislature drew the map. It's just that now there is a state constitutional amendment imposing stricter rules on the process. Fat lot of good that did.

The legislature believed that those strict rules required those red squiggles.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Maybe it's just my impression, but NY (or at least upstate) seems exceptionally "clean" to me. Did they actually get a sound bipartisan compromise ?