Republican Tyranny, Plain & Simple

Update 30 January 2012:  I'm moving this update up front because it is important and because I was wrong.  I stated that the media wouldn't care about this injustice and neither would the American public.   Enough of both cared such that Republicans in four of the six targeted Democratic-leaning states have backed off:  Virginia, Ohio, Florida, and Michigan.  Two states remain up-in-the-air, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.  I hope that Republicans in these two states see the light.  I'm very happy to have been wrong!

Republicans in Virginia have launched the nuclear option in presidential politics.  They are attempting to alter their voting maps for elections, affecting races both state and national races.  In essence, they are carving up the states electoral votes in such a way that a candidate -- and this means ONLY a Republican candidate -- can and will win the state even if this candidate loses the state's popular vote.  And this loss of the popular vote could be by a wide margin and still secure a Republican victory.  Here is a link to how they did it -- that too is a story of deceit and cowardice -- and Josh Marshall at TPM details the plan in full.  From that article:

This all sounds pretty crazy. But it gets even crazier when you see the actual numbers. Here’s a very illustrative example. They’re already pushing a bill to do this in the Virginia legislature. Remember, Barack Obama won Virginia and got 13 electoral votes. But as Benjy Sarlin reportedtoday in a series of posts, if the plan now being worked on would have been in place last November, Mitt Romney would have lost the state but still got 9 electoral votes to Obama’s 4. Think of that, two-thirds of the electoral votes for losing the state. If the Virginia plan had been in place across the country, as Republicans are now planning to do, Mitt Romney would have been elected president even though he lost by more than 5 million votes.

As Marshall indicates, these plans are going forward in states that lean Democratic in presidential elections, but who have state offices controlled by Republicans (e.g. Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan).  These plans vastly undervalue the votes of urban and minority voters and vastly overvalue the votes of whites.  And even groups favoring electoral reform to supplant the electoral college rules that we now have are against this power grab.  Again, Marshall:

To review, here’s how it works. The US electoral college system is based on winner take all delegate allocation in all but two states. If you get just one more vote than the other candidate you get all the electoral votes. One way to change the system is go to proportional allocation. That would still give some advantage to the overall winner. But not much. The key to the Republican plan is to do this but only in Democratic leaning swing states — not in any of the states where Republicans win. That means you take away all the advantage Dems win by winning states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and so forth.

But the Republican plan goes a step further.

Rather than going by the overall vote in a state, they’d allocate by congressional district. And this is where it gets real good, or bad, depending on your point of view. Democrats are now increasingly concentrated in urban areas and Republicans did an extremely successful round of gerrymandering in 2010, enough to enable them to hold on to a substantial House majority even thoughthey got fewer votes in House races than Democrats.

In other words, the new plan is to make the electoral college as wired for Republicans as the House currently is. But only in Dem leaning states. In Republican states just keep it winner take all. So Dems get no electoral votes at all.

Only slavery itself represents a greater subversion of liberty on such a mass scale in American history.  Some call this "sour grapes" by Republicans after their continuing electoral troubles on the national stage and yes, it surely is that.  It is much more than that, however.  It is an affront to the concept of one man, one vote.  It subverts the notion of the protection of the minority against the majority, the bedrock of our founding principles.  It is a blow to freedom itself, being tyranny plain and simple.

And it is the Republican party.  Sadly, it is also the America of today.  The media will not care and neither will the public, placidly chewing their grass like lambs to the slaughter.  As Marshall concludes:  This is happening.

If it doesn't make you ill, you are already lost.

25 January 2013

Addition:  I just reminded myself that preventing women from voting was pretty bad, too.

/facepalm

Addition 2: Virginia governor Bob McDonnell, not traditionally known for his sanity,  has indicated that he is against this change by the state Senate. Thank God!  Now,let's see about those other states.

4 February 2013 Addition:  Another related story on the issue of changing elections was featured today on TPM.  It is worth a look because this issue may be the next national electoral debate.