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Today’s reality defying quote

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The Republicans could easily - and I emphasize that - could easily be a majority party in the House and the Senate if we were dealing with fair maps like they do in places like Iowa. But unfortunately, you know, we’ve been gerrymandered to a degree where we’re in the minority in both chambers. But, if you look at election results for Illinois, I don’t think the representation of the General Assembly is a good reflection of the state as a whole politically.

Um, I would really like to see that data.

There’s no doubt the GOP could be somewhat more competitive, but the party got blown out at almost every level in the suburbs over the past four years.

posted by Rich Miller
Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:14 pm

Comments

This is what the echo chamber sounds like. The suburbs of today are not the suburbs of the 1980s, but no one in Plummer’s world is acknowledging that.

Comment by Former Downstater Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:16 pm
Explain Hillary and Biden’s wins by 17 pts. Or Durbin’s 17 pt win. Or the fact that every statewide office is held by Democrats.

We know Jason is not very good- and emphasize that- not very good at math.

Comment by Wizzard of Ozzie Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:19 pm
Senator Plummer -

You’re describing Ohio as gerrymandered by the GOP. Not Illinois and the Democrats.

Comment by Anyone Remember Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:19 pm
Gerrymandering has become an excuse for losing. Maybe if the policies were better, voters would vote for the republicans. Nah, just kidding.

Comment by Bruce( no not him) Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:21 pm
Easy. One rep per county. Regardless of population.

Comment by Ok Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:22 pm
Illinois voted 58% to 41% to elect Biden over Trump. Illinois’ House is 74-44, right? That’s 63% D. So Ds might lose a few seats if maps were re-drawn exactly proportionally, but it’s also the case that Ds are concentrated in Chicago while Rs are concentrated in rural areas. So no map is going to get you exactly there. Regardless, how would they get to a majority without crazy gerrymandering it *the other way*?

Comment by IL4Life Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:25 pm
Plummer is probably counting all of those counties that keep voting for Republicans instead of acknowledging that half of Illinois counties have fewer people than any ward in Chicago.

Also, land doesn’t vote. People do.

Comment by 47th Ward Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:26 pm
It’s amazing how there is suddenly another excuse for their failure now that Madigan is leaving.

Comment by TheInvisibleMan Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:27 pm
Land doesn’t vote.

Comment by Frank talks Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:28 pm
=== The Republicans could easily - and I emphasize that - could easily be a majority party in the House and the Senate if we were dealing with fair maps like they do in places like Iowa.===

I, too, would like to see those numbers

Here’s where the former “U of I trustee” benchmarks would be an interesting measure, but…

Maybe Plummer needs to look how the Illinois state House sit to a +1 this last cycle after losing Cabello, Skillicorn, and Wehrli, and Stava-Murray still seated.

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:28 pm
==The Republicans could easily - and I emphasize that - could easily be a majority party==

and the Bears would be going to the Superbowl if only Javon Wims caught that pass in the first quarter.

Comment by Jocko Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:29 pm
Easier to claim you are losing badly based on lines, than losing badly on ideas.

Comment by Ron Burgundy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:30 pm
I ask this, not as snark, but to the honesty of Plummer’s premise;

Senator Plummer, it’s a two part question;

Do you think you could win a seat in a suburban district as you are?

Could you find agreement with a Republican who may only agree with you 80% of the time but could win a suburban district?

Yeah. See. That’s the rub, isn’t it?

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:34 pm
Plummer is classic ILGOP; blame everyone and everything else but yourselves and your super-far-right political agenda. With almost nothing to offer the masses, Plummer claims “fair maps” would solve their problems. Not even close to reality. What’s even more amazing is how badly the ILGOP continues to fail while the GOP picked up seats across the country overall. It’s a special kind of stupid.

Comment by thisjustinagain Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:37 pm
Some might say Plummer only thought out around sixty percent, or three fifths, of this idea. Some.

Comment by Precinct Captain Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:38 pm
A Republican map would still need Court approval. That would limit some of the line drawing possibilities. Even with the map, I wouldn’t see 18/45 becoming much more than 22-23/51-53 under current conditions.

Comment by Oldtimer Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:47 pm
Yes, that’s ridiculous. Wisconsin and North Carolina are gerrymandered thus–Republicans completely dominate the legislature despite being narrow favorites at best–but Illinois’ gerrymandering is not of that class. It’s more like Maryland, where an already heavily Democratic state has jiggered districts to make elected bodies even more Democratic.

Comment by Benjamin Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:50 pm
=== It’s more like Maryland, where an already heavily Democratic state===

I disagree.

It’s the recruiting and the tone and tenor of the ILGOP, it’s leadership, and the history of wins by GOP candidates in the past that couldn’t get through a primary have skewed a state that can and is more purple than blue to super majority blue status… “today”

The ILGOP needs to come to terms with its past, the success then, and this idea of purity and exclusion shrinking the party where it could be far more successful.

I know I’m screaming in the wind… but…

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 12:59 pm
They would definitely be a majority in House and in the Senate if they had more members than the Democrats, but they don’t and therefore they aren’t

Comment by DuPage Saint Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:03 pm
Jason, Jason, Jason, your idolized Supreme Court doesn’t care about fair maps. In red states, your party doesn’t care about fair maps. A major part of your party attempted to disenfranchise millions of voters - especially minority voters - by staging a failed deadly coup. Does anyone outside your corrupt party think that is fair.

Since the GOP has clearly demonstrated it’s antipathy for democracy, the only requirement the IL Dems should worry about in drawing the maps is that minorities get their proper representation.

You want politically fair maps then get to your party congressional delegation in other states and propose a constitutional amendment.

Comment by Norseman Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:07 pm
Even the most partisan “Republican” remap proposed after the 2010 census wasn’t thought likely to produce a GOP majority. It would have improved the odds some, but other factors would have been required. Any objectively “fair” map would leave him way short.

Comment by walker Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:07 pm
Using the Presidential results as a proxy for partisanship (not perfect obviously) the House is 4 percent overrepresented by Democrats at 61 percent of seats to 57 percent of the vote for Biden. The Senate is worse with 69 percent of seats and 12 percent overrepresented. Redistricting should be more fair in the process so electeds cannot choose their voters, but it’s not the sort of thing that would swing control of the chambers.

Comment by ArchPundit Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:09 pm
=== It would have improved the odds some, but other factors would have been required.===

Candidate recruiting and an inclusive thought to the party?

The idea “the map” is the magic elixir defies the real discussion of why the GOP can’t win seats and why the statewides are all Dems.

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:17 pm
We should take a step back and recognize that Senator Plummer is looking at the Iowa legislative district map and failing to recognize that Iowa has a quarter of Illinois’ population and fewer urban metropolitan areas because he is only looking at the legislative map.

So, he’s seeing a bunch of neat lines that closely match county lines and failing to understand that the districts are based off of population and that the Iowa’s remapping process attempts to place 100% of a county in a district if they can without splitting it.

To make it clear, I am suggesting that Senator Plummer is looking at a map and is thinking that land/counties is what matters for district representation and failing to understand that there would be massive multi-county rural state house and state senate districts in Illinois, but it would just be all of one county in that district.

Comment by Candy Dogood Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:17 pm
Point of Information

According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s July 1, 2019 estimates, only 25 of Illinois 102 counties, including Cook, have more population than the average for a City of Chicago ward (53,880).

Charlie Wheeler

Comment by Charlie Wheeler Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:26 pm
This seems like more of the same type of #stopthesteal, QAnon rabble-rousing that has backfired on the far right.

Comment by Mary Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:31 pm
Gee, we wonder why the people that vote for guys like this are so misinformed.

Comment by Ducky LaMoore Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:36 pm
JB won by 17 points. Hillary won by 17 points. Sean Casten and Lauren Underwood won GOP seats. Ummm, Jason, you may want to look a bit more to your disastrous party’s role in your failures.

And yea, Fair maps would help…a little. Fixing your party would hel…a lot.

Comment by Chicago Cynic Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:40 pm
Do you remember the Jif commercial with the kids trying to cut a sandwich in half fairly? The first kid gets to make the cut, but the second kid gets to choose first. Thus, the first kid has an incentive to cut as evenly as possible.

That could be a really interesting way to draw maps. Maybe the majority party draws the House districts, but the minority party gets to pair 2 House districts to make a Senate district. Or vice versa.

There are other variations on the idea that could produce some interesting results. We should have some Econ profs at the U of I evaluate the outcomes using Game Theory to see how this would affect mapmaking and “fairness” of the resulting maps.

Source: https://mindyourdecisions.com/blog/2009/01/13/fair-division-and-game-theory-in-a-jif-peanut-butter-commercial/

Comment by thechampaignlife Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:44 pm
Maybe the Plummer/Illinois Sen GOP issue isn’t the map.. How about their recently departed leader left the caucus with almost $900k unspent the last cycle??

Comment by NotRich Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:45 pm
=== We should have some Econ profs at the U of I evaluate the outcomes using Game Theory to see how this would affect mapmaking and “fairness” of the resulting maps.===

With respect,

With that simulation, if you ran a “Jason Plummer” as the GOP candidate, every district, do you think the type of candidate might be a mitigating factor?

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:46 pm
What do you expect from a Dodgers fan.

Comment by Blue Dog Dem Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 1:58 pm
this jason plummer? is this the guy speaking with authority? thanks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lICjD0aw9M

Comment by blue line Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:02 pm
After Governor Rauner did such an excellent job, gained consensus, and solved all Illinois’ problems, the ILGOP won both House and Senate in landslides…

…in BIZARRO Illinois. /s

Comment by Streator Curmudgeon Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:04 pm
The Republican Party in year 2021 is something to behold…in awe.

Comment by Dotnonymous Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:12 pm
If the Republicans wanted to be competitive again in IL, they would have covertly moved to pass the Fair Tax and then make the Democrats have to vote for all the increases.

Lack of a progressive tax is awful for IL’s revenue, but it’s great for IL Democrats representing upscale suburbs.

The GOP cannot last long pushing for tax -cuts-, or freezes in state spending, because their own constituents get hammered at least as hard as the Democrats’. Downstate needs the cash from Springfield.

Comment by ZC Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:14 pm
Looking at the later post about what some Republicans in the 16th CD are proposing, maybe that might have something to do with the minority status of their party rather than just maps.

Comment by West Side the Best Side Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:22 pm
My sister and I discussed this extensively over the holidays… What if one could take politicians out of it entirely and let a computer algorithm draw the lines with a simple set of rules? Something like:
1. All districts must have the same number of residents.
2. All districts must have four sides, except in situations where one or more sides are made up of geographical boundaries (state lines, rivers, etc.)
3. Political affiliation of the residents is to play no role in the computer’s drawing of the lines.

The algorithm would likely kick out multiple sets of boundaries that fit the above criteria. Deciding the most fair option out of these possibilities would be could be done by a bipartisan commission or through random selection. Thoughts?

Comment by Dysfunction Junction Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:54 pm
- Dysfunction Junction -

Did you forget the Voting Rights Act and representation within maps?

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 2:57 pm
===do you think the type of candidate might be a mitigating factor?===

Absolutely, mitigating or confounding. The big brains know how to handle these, but I presume they would control for candidate factors (i.e., assume the candidate is a spherical cow: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spherical_cow).

Comment by thechampaignlife Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:02 pm
He may be right, but not in the way he suggests. Gerrymandering creates radicals. It’s how the worst of the worst get away with it (take a look at Jim Jefford’s district).

So… if there were fair maps, candidates in GOP friendly districts might have to tack to the center somewhat to win. Then the party isn’t dominated by cretins, and thus makes fewer embarrassing moves and appeals more to suburbanites and swing voters. Next thing you know, you’re competitive. Or at least not a super-minority.

Comment by lake county democrat Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:04 pm
===All districts must have four sides===

There are laws about minority voting rights on the books. This isn’t a sophomore dorm room.

Comment by Rich Miller Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:04 pm
=== The big brains know how to handle these, but I presume they would control for candidate factors===

Thing is… multi-candidate primaries, as one example, deny opportunities to try to have better candidates.

Look at; Oberweis, Jim, 2020 Congressional primary.

Politics is not all science, just as it isn’t all art.

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:05 pm
@Dysfunction Junction:

An easier solution is to increase the number of representatives. It sounds counterintuitive, but it is harder to pack or dilute people in districts when there are more districts. Consider the extreme: 1 district per 10 people would be far more likely to be representative of the overall population than 1 district per 1,000,000 people.

Comment by thechampaignlife Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:07 pm
Sorry OW and Rich for the apparently simple-minded proposal; no snark is intended, and I must admit neither my sister nor I know the ins, outs, and history of the VRA other than understanding the noble goal of eliminating discriminatory “tests and devices” (which in any event such a computer-drawn map would not introduce). Our main goal was a simple one: eliminate the opportunity for politicians & parties to pick their voters instead of the other way around.

Following the principle of one person/one vote and the principle that elected representatives should reflect the concerns of the constituents in their geographical regions, it seems that simple compact boundaries would better represent the will of all voters in a region, regardless of race/economic class/etc. What am I overlooking? Serious question - what aspect of the VRA would such a simple algorithmic plan violate?

Comment by Dysfunction Junction Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:30 pm
===simple===

It won’t be simple is probably my answer, without any snark on it.

The art and science of a map, then draw it for a state like Illinois versus Iowa, with Voting Rights Act parameters and such, it’s also where Plummer is failing to see beyond his own myopic view that candidate recruiting and a bigger GOP tent aren’t “add ons” to his simple belief a GOP majority is possible by merely a map.

Hope that helps. Be well.

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:34 pm
With a “Republican” map in the 1990’s, the Senate under Pate Philip controlled but the House GOP could only oust Madigan as Speaker for 2 years. And, the demographics got a WHOLE lot worse for the GOP and suburban woman fled in droves!

Comment by Transit Guy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:38 pm
Here’s an article that discusses algorithms to combat gerrymandering and notes the Voting Rights Act issue (though it just makes my policy argument that minority gerrymandered districts often dilute the political power). It would be interesting to run this one on Illinois and see if it produced any districts that required redrawing. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/06/03/this-computer-programmer-solved-gerrymandering-in-his-spare-time/

Comment by lake county democrat Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 3:39 pm
Dysfunction Junction - the VRA is more than just the simple words from the statute. It is also 5 decades of court decisions fine-tuning how to apply that language to real cases from the states that either intentionally or not reduced the ability of minorities to elect their candidates of choice when they met appropriate criteria such as sufficient population.

Many computer algorithms have been developed to create ensembles of maps that create districts. They typically would discriminate in violation of the VRA even though it is unintentional. There is at least one group I know of that is trying to encode criteria that would respect the VRA, but it hasn’t published any results yet.

Comment by muon Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 5:01 pm
Transit Guy -

I’d say that the House GOP that ousted Madigan was not the Illinois House GOP but the national Newt-wave … .

Comment by Anyone Remember Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 6:06 pm
=== I’d say that the House GOP that ousted Madigan was not the Illinois House GOP but the national Newt-wave … .===

“Why not both?”

In the end, the demographics made it impossible for Daniels to “repeat the feat”

Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Jan 21, 21 @ 6:13 pm

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