The Senate: So Rigged That Democrats May Never Control It Ever Again, Ian Millhiser

[appalachiablue]

'The Senate Is So Rigged That Democrats May Never Control It Ever Again,' Think Progress, Nov. 7, 2018. It would be nice to live in a Democratic Republic.

It’s the day after Election Day, and Democrats just handed Republicans the GOP’s collective asses. Though the sheer magnitude of the Republican loss remains uncertain — ballots are still being counted, and blue California may take weeks to complete its count — early projections suggest that Democratic House candidates may have won the national popular vote by 7 points. That’s a bigger margin of victory than the Republican wave in 2010 (6.8 points) or the GOP wave in 2014 (5.7 points).

And yet, it wasn’t enough. Republicans will hold the Senate and, with it, the power to fill the federal courts with Republican stalwarts. This is partially due to the absolutely brutal map Democrats faced in 2018. Thanks to strong performances in 2006 and 2012, Democrats had to defend 26 seats this election cycle, while Republicans only had to defend 9.

But this unfavorable map is only a small part of the story. In the outgoing Senate — the Senate that placed Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court — the 49 senators in the Democratic “minority” represent almost 40 million more people than the Republican “majority.” In the incoming Senate, the Democratic “minority” will still represent millions more people — despite the fact that Republicans grew their “majority” last night.

And this malapportionment is only going to get worse. By 2040, according to Baruch College’s David Birdsell, about 70 percent of Americans are expected to live in just 15 states. That means that the vast majority of Americans will control just 30 percent of the Senate, while the remaining 70 senators are elected by just 30 percent of the nation.

America’s endgame, in other words, is a nation that can no longer meaningfully be described as a democracy — and we are already very far along to that destination. The state of Wyoming has only 573,720 people, according to U.S. Census estimates. That’s 1/68th of the population of California. And yet the 39,776,830 Californians are represented by just two senators — the same number as Wyoming.

Indeed, to put the case against Wyoming into fuller context, Wyoming has fewer people than Milwaukee, Baltimore, or Louisville. The fourth largest city in California, San Francisco, has more than 300,000 more residents than the entire state of Wyoming. In total, there are 31 U.S. cities with a greater population than Wyoming. One of them, the nation’s capital, has no representation whatsoever in the Senate. -More...

More, https://thinkprogress.org/the-senate-is-so-rigged-that-democrats-may-never-control-it-ever-again-14ede9ac5f01/

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1. poor analysis. "the map" isn't "a small part of the story". it *is* the story.

we won 23 out of 34 seats for a 67% success rate.
that's consistent with, and in fact exceeds our aggregate popular vote total for all senate races this cycle.

we didn't do poorly at all by any objective measure.

it's just unfortunate that the map was so tough.

we just need a comparable vote pattern in 2020, and ideally in 2022 as well.

[marylandblue]

2. Have a chance to take back the Senate in 2020

If ww get full control of the government, we need a group of initiatives to realign the Senate. These would be:
-Statehood for DC, PR, Guam and Virgin Islands.
-Split California in 2.
-New Voting Rights Act to end vote suppression and increase registration.

[MosheFeingold]

3. This fight was first fought

At the Constitutional Convention.

It’s a balance of power thing between urban and rural areas, and has been both good and bad over 200 years.

Back then, as now, the population was greatly in the NE and less elsewhere.

Which group is liberal and which conservative flips over generations. I’m old enough to recall when the senate was the bastion of liberalism.

These things flip every generation or so.

Running a country, long term, should reflect decisions made over the course of centuries, not by whatever temporary political wind.

You switch to make the senate to be based on population like the house, and it will bite your grandkids in the rear.

[Wintryjade]

4. Prior to this win in the House, they said the same about the House.

For a lot fo years I was hearing the gerrymandering would never allow us to take the house again. So when conversation came up we would take the house, I was thinking, we were told we could never take the house again. We need to go after the gerrymandering and suppression of votes in these states. Especially Georgia which is in plain site. And Florida, Ohio.

[lagomorph777]

6. +1.

[lagomorph777]

5. Eventually even the Disposables will tire of being robbed, just so they can have racists in power.

Then the Senate will flip.

[Zambero]

7. Same was said after the GOP flip in 2010

And statehouse gerrymandering was predicted to give the GOP a permanent grip on the House. However, dynamics continue to change and this will apply to future Senate races. Despite Dem gains, the GOP gerrymandering did have a limited effect, and if the Congressional boundaries had not been so heavily manipulated, the "wave" would have been amplified well beyond yesterday's actual gains.

[stopbush]

8. Gerrymandering has nothing to do with the Senate, of course.

Blame the Constitution.

Do we really need two Dakotas? Do we really need both Montana and Idaho? How about we combine some of these negative population states into one state? How about there be a population threshhold, say, 2-million residents, for an area to be considered a state?

Just spit ballin here.

[MosheFeingold]

9. I don't think

There is a mechanism to un-state a state, just like there is no mechanism to leave the union.

[Nitram]

10. Never say never. Nothing is forever. Things always change.