Secrets of the City

Like Ellison in the 5th she will be there as long as she wants unless she gets caught having an affair with Ellison (or real redistricting happens).

I think she will resign shortly to join the 2012 Cougar ticket with Palin.

With Clark and Tinklenberg, seeing that they’ll be vying for the DFL nod in the endorsement and/or primary process, there’s little chance of splitting the moderates vote in the general.

Don’t know about Reed, since she’s seeking both the IP and DFL nomination.

I thought Tinklenberg had a relatively strong finish. Doesn’t that portend of a DFL candidate with a well-financed campaign doing well enough to (OMG) win?

More people now know Bachmann is a laughing stock. If she were to garner 47% of the vote again, I would seriously consider erecting a wall between us and the entire 6th District.

David Brauer made an interesting point on a MinnPost update: This is kind of a bizarre choice, if Clark follows through with this decision, since Minnesota is likely to lose one representative after the 2010 census, and the 6th is a pretty good bet to be the district lost.

@mnblrmkr: Oh, jeez. Imagine the outcry from all those disenfranchised GOPhers. “Obama is stealing our representation! Commie pinko muslin111!1″

Who would they hide Sen. Pogemiller behind? That’s the question.

I don’t know Tarryl Clark, but I do personally know the other two DFLers seeking the nomination. I also know the 6th, where I live. Yes, a DFLer could win there, but that largely depends on the political mood of the country at election time and Rep. Bachmann herself.

If she has another outburst of controversial statements just before the election, as she did last time, she might just cook her own goose. The 6th is not quite so conservative as some of you seem to think.

The DFL’s biggest problem will be to determine the strongest candidate among the three (all have their strengths) and to rally behind the nominee. Clark and Tinklenberg will play by the rules, but what Dr. Reed will do if she doesn’t get the nod is a bit of a mystery. If she runs as an independent, she could split the anti-Bachmann (not necessarily DFL) votes, allowing Michele to win again.

So, with Michelle Bachman’s anti-census tirades which could mean less people in her district filling the census out. By fewer people filling out the census, that could indicate a lessening Minnesota population. Thus, resulting in the loss of a Representative. Which would undoubtedly mean cutting the insane 6th district into the surrounding districts. Hence meaning that Michelle loses her seat. Is this irony? Or, is it just stupidity?

Yo, Max. I posted something about another Minnesota Rep. Did it get spam filtered?

Actually, that’s an interesting question: when a state loses a district, how do you decide which one? As much as I’d love to see it be hers, that seems unfair. Is it just the one with the smallest population difference from last time?

Douglas, the expectation is that MN is going to lose a rep no matter what. MN population growth is simply not as great as other states in the south and southwest.

And to be fair to her, Bachmann is telling people to go ahead and answer the question about how many people are in the household. It’s everythign else she objects to.

Actually, they end up redrawing all of the district lines to the new population numbers. Making each district roughly the same size population-wise. Each district will change, but since the sixth is so screwy — chances are it will change the most.

I don’t think too many of us in the 6th are taking Michele Bachmann’s worries about the census very seriously, DouglasG.

I mean, do you take a Hajj to Mecca, just because Keith Ellison does? (g)  If so, who pays for the trip?

I do whatever Betty tells me to do. (I’m not in Keith’s district)

Let us put this in perspective of a typical Michelle Bachmann voter. If she tells you there is a problem with the census, are you going to pay attention to her “nuanced” request or are you going to just ignore the entire thing? Remember, put yourself in the shoes of someone who voted for Michelle…

when a state loses a district, how do you decide which one?

It’s not so much losing a district, per se, as it is redrawing district lines when losing a representative to acknowledge a change in population and population distribution. A representative is to serve x number of constituents. Right now, each US Representative in Congress represents around 647,000 people. (Fun fact: You can get a ballpark figure of each states’ population by multipying that number by the number of Representatives they have serving in D.C. Minnesota’s 8 representatives x 647k = 5,176.000 … very close to the estimated 2008 pop. of  5,220,000.)

District lines, then, are drawn to evenly distribute representation throughout the state. State boundaries were also drawn up along similar criteria. E.g. the Minnesota territory was far larger than what became the state of Minnesota.

As it is, the 6th is one of the great examples of gerrymandering. The best one, though, was the 12th District in North Carolina.

I love the word gerrymandering. Gerrymandering, gerrymandering, gerrymandering…

(sigh)

So in 2012, there are no incumbents, then, but presumably everyone will sorta lay claim to the district that most resembles the one they were representing before?

Also, in terms of gerrymandering, isn’t the point to efficiently spread out your voters so they can win as many districts as possible? It seems like the sixth district, as drawn, is a waste to republicans because it’s needlessly overwhelmingly conservative.

Remember, put yourself in the shoes of someone who voted for Michelle…

What makes you think I didn’t–twice?

My dad would have, but I threatened to never go visit them again.

Remember, you have to live in the district you represent. Thus, you don’t get to decide where you run, unless you wish to move.

If you spread the party too thinly in an area, you may not be able to overcome the oppositions numbers. Thus, it seems that the best way to assure that your side gets a representative is to overload at least one district. I think that is the thinking…

The expectation is that MN will go from 8 to 7 representatives. So, yeah, we will lose a representative. Not because we lost population, but because states in the south and southwest grew much faster.
Since the number of representatives in the US House is fixed (though Congress could increase it; they have in the past), one of “our” representative seats will be given to another state.

It will be interesting to see what happens after the census. Last redistricting, when we avoided losing a rep, the Republicans tried to carve out a new suburban district by proposing that Mpls-St Paul be combined into a single district. I’m sure that they’ll propose it again.

So in 2012, there are no incumbents, then, but presumably everyone will sorta lay claim to the district that most resembles the one they were representing before?

Most states will only have to adjust district boundaries to reflect the new population distribution. Not sure who frequently two sitting Reps have to decide between moving or facing off against another incumbent if the state hasn’t lost a seat.

I know at the state level, John Hottinger moved to stay in a district with more favorable demographics. 

As was mentioned, the 6th district was drastically redrawn (Kline actually ran against Luther in the 6th  twice, before Luther was redistricted out of office).

And, of course, there’s the Texas case, where the GOP took a second try at redistricting, and forced several Democrats to run against each other.

A classmate of mine had a great proposal this semester: Increase the size of the House of Reps. With the current House set at 435 seats, each member represents about 300,000 people. His proposal was to increase the size so no member represented more than 150,000 people. That would more than double the size of the house, which would then limit the massive fundraising that all members have to do every two years and give citizens greater access to their rep. I love the idea.

Totally off topic but since this changed to a redistricting conversation, I thought I’d throw it out.

Oh, and I like the idea of a wall around the 6th, if nothing else it’ll keep the riffraff (I’m looking at you, Bob) out of the rest of the state. Or we can just give the 6th to Wisconsin.

“You show me a 50-foot wall and I’ll show you a 51-foot ladder. Never underestimate a person’s sense of desperation. So, building a wall is not the answer.”

–Janet Napolitano, speaking during her 2006 re-election campaign as governor of Arizona.

“You show me a 50-foot wall and I’ll show you a 51-foot ladder”

Any reporter wouldn’t leave that one out of his or her notes.

That’s glib enough. Not sure if it’s much more than that, though.

With the current House set at 435 seats, each member represents about 300,000 people.

Bad math.

The current US population is around 300,000,000.

300MM/435=689,655. Much closer to the figure I used above.

Here’s a link that shows the periodic increase in House seats based on population and apportionment.

It’s interesting to note that a Representative in 2008 has a constituency that is approximately 10x greater than that of a 1789 Representative.

Update: according to this article from the AP, as few as 3,000 people in the next census could tip the balance, one way or another, on Minnesota losing a seat in Congress.