Five states bordering the Great Lakes—Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin—are the central battleground in the fight to control redistricting. Sure, the Republicans might take back the House of Representatives on election night. But winning gubernatorial and state legislative races in these five states could allow the GOP to dominate the House for much longer than the next few years.
The Republicans now control four of the ten legislative chambers in the five states in question. They also hold the governor's office in Indiana. But after Tuesday's election, Republican governors could be running all five states—and the Dems could easily lose their grip on the six legislative chambers they control today.
That's a prospect that has national Democrats very worried. Carolyn Fiddler, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, which aids Dems in state legislative races, says that she's seen maps that corral all of the Democrats in Ohio into just four districts—down from ten current Democratic-leaning districts. (Ohio is also set to lose two representatives in post-Census population adjustments.) GOP redistricters in Pennsylvania could easily cut that state's Dem delegation in half, Fiddler adds. That would mark a dramatic change from the current balance of 12 Dems to seven Republicans. (Pennsylvania is also likely to lose a seat.)
The result would be that the GOP could count on an extra 16-20 seat swing in their favor for holding the House, and midwest Dems would all be herded into one or two districts in a state, with Dems winning in those districts overwhelmingly, but the rest of the state would have easy GOP victories because all the urban vote would be in one place.
I woudn't put it past Ohio Republicans to create an I-71 corridor district to connect the urban centers of Cincy, Columbus and Cleveland and give it to Kucinich...and he'd literally be the only Dem in the state come 2012.
That's what's really at stake here, and that means the GOP will be able to keep the House for a long, long time.
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This is nothing compared to what likely will be on the ballot in California in 2012. The Right is going to try to put a proposition on the ballot that would apportion electoral college votes by congressional district.
This could tip every presidential election for the next 20 years to the GOP.
They will pour money into this proposition like neve before. $100 million. $150 million. Since Meg Whitman will lose spending $180million, they will have to think of new tricks. CA will be the laboratory for a whole new kind of politics. Astroturf groups and fake think tanks to promote it. Glenn Beckish mass rallies with bussed in multitudes. God knows what else.
It's coming.
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