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Gerrymandering has a long and unpopular history in the United States. It is the main reason that the country ranked 55th of 158 nations — last among Western democracies — in a 2017 index of voting fairness run by the Electoral Integrity Project
[...] Lawsuits fighting partisan gerrymandering are pending around the country, and a census planned for 2020 is expected to trigger nationwide redistricting. If the mathematicians succeed in laying out their case, it could influence how those maps are drawn.
[...] States such as Arizona and Iowa, which have independent or bipartisan commissions that oversee the creation of voting districts, fared much better. In a separate analysis, Daniel McGlone, a geographic-information-system data analyst at the technology firm Azavea in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, ranked each state’s voting districts for compactness as a measure of gerrymandering, and found that Maryland had the most-gerrymandered districts. North Carolina came second. Nevada, Nebraska and Indiana were the least gerrymandered.
[...] In the summer of 2016, a bipartisan panel of retired judges met to see whether they could create a more representative set of voting districts for North Carolina. Their maps gave Mattingly a chance to test his index. The judges’ districts, he found, were less gerrymandered than in 75% of the computer-generated models — a sign of a well-drawn, representative map. By comparison, every one of the 24,000 computer-drawn districts was less gerrymandered than either the 2012 or 2016 voting districts drawn by state legislators
[...] Political scientist Nicholas Stephanopoulos at the University of Chicago, Illinois, takes a much simpler approach to measuring gerrymandering. He has developed what he calls an “efficiency gap”, which measures a state’s wasted votes: all those cast for a losing candidate in each district, and all those for the victor in excess of the proportion needed to win. If one party has lots of landslide victories and crushing losses compared with its rivals, this can be a sign of gerrymandering.
Note: Please try to keep the discussion on the topic of gerrymandering.
http://www.nature.com/news/the-mathematicians-who-want-to-save-democracy-1.22113
https://arxiv.org/abs/1410.8796
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 09 2017, @02:06PM
Our current system was setup in the days of near non-existent long range communications.
1] WoM - word of mouth
Who you votin' for?
Bob.
Whar's he from?
New York.
Nev'r heard of either.
-- later he's a dem/rep/ind/etc is only answer
-- think I'll vote for him then [no knowledge just "pull the lever"]
2] Local News papers
3] Pony Express [could spread news papers]
4] TODAY -- NEAR INSTANT internet, email, TV, Radio and Preachers [oops, pull their 501c3 for politicking from the pulpit]
Since we are repeating/continuing history get on line and watch The History Channel -- The Men Who Built America Episode 7: Taking the White House
William Bryan was set to win [dem] and Morgan/Carnegie/Rockefeller bought McKinley [repug] the win [smear ads...FUD fear uncertainty doubt....etc]
Sound familiar...that was 1897 with #25 and it is even worse today with #45.
[Just a note I was born under #34]
Please visit fairvote.org to understand how the modern voting should be done.
Read each of the menu tabs [problems] then [solutions] and all links in each and all tabs.
Note [what's new] then [Local Elections in Texas Demonstrate the Power - and Limits - of Cumulative Voting Rights]
If Texans are getting smart enough then the rest of the country should get on board.
Also watch the skit by George Carlin [language but nails it as always] -- it's a rich boys club and you are not in it.
Ranked Choice Voting is how corporations elect new board members.
Also this restores the "you work for us" that is the intention of who we send into the political arena.
One thing what will be needed is a "nation wide" web site so that everyone and get equal education about the
"resume" of those that are running. Remember a resume from your last year in English in High School?
So by this each person running as "ponied up" the same amount to get in the race.
Now I can find President or Oklahoma > Governor or Senate/House/etc all the way down to county and city elections.
And the "public air waves" MUST return to the people.
-no trashing the other person
-what is your qualification and future for a "specific" topic
-ALL stations will give equal time blocks for all candidates as part of being a "public service" and within "normal hours" not all at 2am.
Remove Citizens United [corp is not people] and lobbyist [they can go to "local" politician office just like we have to]
No more tagging on your junk, if your boat doesn't float take it back to port and re-engineer it.
We don't need 1400 laws a year, a few dozen properly done to keep from bogging the courts down will do.
Transaction Tax on sales [just 2% 1 fed 1 state] no kids, poverty, etc no "wholesale" the entire chain is taxed == used car 2%, Porsche 2%, McMansion 2%, food 2%
Just my $0.0175 [adjusted 2 cents]
The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits. - Albert Einstein
Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods." -- Albert Einstein
The significant problems we face cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them. - Albert Einstein
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein.
If you are unable to understand the cause of a problem, it is impossible to solve it - Naoto Kan, Japanese Politician
For every complex problem, there is an answer that is clear, simple and absolutely wrong.