Posts Tagged ‘datechguy's magnificent seven’

Two lawsuits filed over Democrats’ gerrymandered legislative districts in Illinois

Posted: June 13, 2021 by John Ruberry in elections, News/opinion, politics
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Minding the Illinois political maze for decades.

By John Ruberry

Since posting my Illinois gerrymandering entry here last week there is an update.

First some background: Despite multiple promises to veto a partisan remap of Illinois state legislative districts, Democratic governor JB Pritzker signed into law new hyper-partisan new state House and Senate districts, claiming that these new maps preserve diversity.

Not so fast, JB.

Late Thursday the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, on behalf of five Hispanic voters, filed suit in federal court claiming that the new maps are “malapportioned.” AP sums up the controversey beautifully. “But the challenge from MALDEF,” the wire service says, “expands the source of objections to the very groups whose voting rights Democrats say they are protecting.”

Earlier last week the Illinois Republican Party also filed a federal lawsuit that claims that the new maps violate the 14th Amendment to the US Contsitution’s Equal Protection Clause.

Indeed it may. Illinois’ constitution states that new General Assembly district maps must be drawn by legislators by the end of June after each decennial census. If not, the process moves to an eight-person committee evenly split between Republicans and Democrats. If that panel can’t come to a decision then two names are placed in a hat, one Republican and one Democrat. Lovers of political theater will be thrilled to learn that the four times the remapping committee was formed, three times times no decision was reached and the tiebreaker clause was invoked. In 2000 a stovepipe hat said to have been worn by Abraham Lincoln was used for the tiebreaking ceremony.

The complete Census figures won’t be available until August. But it’s clear that the Democrats didn’t want the redistricting process to be left by chance, or worse, given to Republicans. So the Dems, rather than work with hard numbers, instead used population estimates from the American Community Survey.

This weekend on Fox Chicago’s Flannery Fired Up, host Mike Flannery ventured into what-aboutism expressed by the left regarding gerrymandering in Republican states. During an interview with state Rep. Tim Butler (R-Springfield).  Flannery phrased their argument this way, “That the Democrats here stopped short of annihilating as many Republicans as they could in the General Assembly–do you buy that?” Butler responded that he does not and he explained to Flannery, “We have 14 members–Republican members of the House–that were drawn in districts together and we have zero Democrats that were drawn into districts together.” That’s an observation the Wall Street Journal made earlier this month. Because of Democratic gerrymandering after the 2010 census, there are currenly only 45 Republicans among the 118 members in the Illinois House. 

While of course there are no state or federal legal protections to protect GOP state legislators, as I mentioned earlier in this post and last week, Pritzker promised he would veto a partisan remap.

There is a better way. Twice in the 2010s enough signatures were collected to put an amendment to the Illinois Constitution on the general election ballot that would take redistricting out of the hands of legislators and placing a non-partisan committee in control. Twice a lawyer closely tied to Boss Michael Madigan (D-Chicago), the longtime Illinois House speaker who was forced out of power early this year, sued to block having Illinois voters decide the issue. In a party-line vote, the Illinois Supreme Court sided with the Democrats both times.

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

Massachusetts is finally returning to normal…for now

Posted: June 10, 2021 by Jon Fournier in Uncategorized
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Just before Memorial Day Governor Charlie Baker finally lifted the majority of restrictions he single-handedly placed on all of the inhabitants of Massachusetts way back last March.  Gone are the capacity limits placed on restaurants and retail establishments, which were set at only25 percent. 

Bars are finally allowed to open, those that were not forced to close permanently for financial reasons after having their doors shuttered for fifteen months.  Finally I can go to bars and enjoy craft beers and listen to live music !!! That is a past time I greatly enjoy and have not been able to do for more than a year. 

I can go to restaurants without covering my face with a face diaper.  For a lengthy time we were required to wear masks at all times inside restaurants except when actually taking a bite. That was such a ridiculously bothersome rule that I stopped going to restaurants when that rule was imposed.   I am so enjoying eating out again. Unfortunately so many restaurants in Massachusetts closed because of Governor Bakers restrictions.  They could not remain open operating at only 25 percent capacity, imagine that.

Mask mandates were lifted and replaced with a mask advisory for those not vaccinated.  It is so wonderful to breath freely outdoors and indoors   I would have ignored mask mandates for just unvaccinated individuals.  That would have been unenforceable without vaccine passports, which are unconstitutional;  I am quite pleasantly astounded that Emperor Baker did not impose vaccine passports.   That is just the kind of big government fascism that our faux Republican governor has been saddling us with since the beginning of this pandemic.

School kids are still forced to wears masks, even during recess.  For the past several days it’s been in the 90s with high humidity.  Governor Baker is putting school children through hell and that is child abuse on a grand scale.

I am worried that in the fall there will be a slight spike in Coronavirus cases and Governor Baker will impose the same liberty and economy destroying restrictions again.  I am worried that some other crisis will come along, even an imaginary one such as climate change, and locked down we will be again.  Governor Baker is a firm believer in man made global warming.  He singed Massachusetts up for an interstate compact to fight climate change which saddled us with a hefty new gas tax.  

We the people must demand that the state legislature reign in the Governor’s emergency declarations powers so that this nightmare never happens again.  I am not confident at all that that would happen. The people of this state have proved to be for the most part compliant sheeple.  Not that I expected anything different.  This is the Peoples Republic of Massachusetts after all.  

Report from Louisiana: Your Best Self

Posted: June 7, 2021 by Pat Austin in Uncategorized
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By: Pat Austin

SHREVEPORT –I have just returned to Shreveport after eight days in south Louisiana; for eight days I did not turn on a television. I looked at Facebook nonsense only once a day, and I read zero newspapers. For eight days I have been blissfully unaware of the wider world around me and only concerned about what I was going to eat that day or what rural road I might explore. Is the snow cone stand open today?  Is that a snake in the bayou over there? 

We go to south Louisiana about five times a year and spend a week completely unplugged from the news. It is wonderful! We do talk to people, though, and I can assure you that this part of the state is still staunchly Trump and hoping for a Trump comeback in 2024. It is the NOLA area that is more Democrat, of course, around New Orleans, but most of Louisiana remains politically conservative.

The area we visit is heavily Catholic; my husband and I attend an Episcopal church, which he calls Catholic-Lite.  Without getting into the theological differences, let’s just say that we can attend a Catholic Mass and not look too much out of place. We attended Saturday afternoon Mass and we did okay.

The priest delivered a sermon that resonated with me; the night before, Friday, the diocese that includes Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, and Arnaudville, Louisiana (where we were), began a summer series of discussions called Theology on the Bayou. The event was open to the public and held at Bayou Teche Brewing in Arnaudville, in their event space.

Theology in a brewery?  Well, why not? 

The event was a huge success; we got there about fifteen minutes before it started which enabled us to get a beer and find a seat. We spoke to Father Travis, “our” priest, and he introduced us to Father McIntyre from Breaux Bridge who was leading the evening’s program. As we waited for the event to begin, we watched the amazement unfold on their faces as people began pouring into the room; they just kept coming. More chairs had to be set up, then more chairs, then people squished up closer together and more chairs came out. The room was busting at the seams.  It was pretty amazing.

The theme of the night’s discussion was “What makes us human?” and basically, becoming a better human. One of the questions Father McIntyre asked was “What person in your life makes you your best self; that allows you to be, and to become, who you really are?” The part of the night that resonated so much with me was the discussion part when people shared ideas and just talked. I loved the community of it, the mutual desire to be better people, better Christians, and stronger in family and faith.

That’s a message I can get behind no matter what religion it comes from. As we all sat in that room, most with a beer, several with pizza (they served terrific wood-fired pizza there), and the doors open to allow the cross breeze in, I looked at the assembled faces; all ages were present. Husbands, wives, kids, grandparents, everyone. It was pretty special.

At Mass the next day, Father Travis had a similar message for his congregation: that we should be more open, more welcoming, basically, our best selves.

Now that I’m back in Shreveport, where we have daily shootings, the highest homicide rate since the 1980s, and an overload of negativity, decay, and decline, I’m thinking that unplugging for a while might be necessary to my mental well-being! Real life (as opposed to vacation life) brings enough responsibility and obligation as it is without the negativity that social media and even main stream media brings.

If I’m going to be my best self, my happiest self, it is definitely something to consider.

Pat Austin blogs at And So it Goes in Shreveport and at Medium; she is the author of Cane River Bohemia: Cammie Henry and her Circle at Melrose Plantation. Follow her on Instagram @patbecker25 and Twitter @paustin110.

RT —

Whenever a liberal complains to you about gerrymandering, your reply needs to be, “What about Illinois?”

Posted: June 6, 2021 by John Ruberry in elections, elections, News/opinion, politics
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By John Ruberry

A month ago I wrote about Illinois General Assembly Democrats, behind closed doors, redrawing legislative maps. The Dems, thanks to their gerrymandering after the 2010 Census, already enjoy supermajorities in both chambers of the General Assembly.

There was hope, a quite naive one to be sure, that because Illinois’ Democratic governor, J.B. Pritzker, firmly promised, many times, that he would veto any partisan remap proposal, that fair maps could eventually emerge.

Shortly before Election Day in 2018, again as I noted last month, Pritzker had this to say to an NRP reporter, “I will not sign a bill that is gerrymandered, I have been for independent maps for a long time now.”

Well Pritzker isn’t for independent maps anymore even though, as the Wall Street Journal (paid subscription required) reported just two weeks ago, the Chicago billionaire promised to veto “an unfair map.”

Pritzker lied. On Friday he signed into law a hyperpartisan gerrymandered map. And going a step further, for the first time in five decades Illinois’ Supreme Court districts were redrawn. Do I have to tell you which party the new court districts will favor?

From the Wall Street Journal editorial board:

Illinois Democrats hold a statehouse supermajority, every statewide office and a state Supreme Court majority. That sounds like a monopoly on power. But with voters starting to revolt against the state’s fiscal woes and political corruption, Democrats are now working to further entrench their power.

Late last week Democrats jammed through new state legislative maps that combine 14 Republicans in the Illinois House into seven districts. That means seven GOP incumbents are guaranteed to lose in party primaries. Republicans will also lose their incumbent advantage in seven districts. No Democrats were combined in the same House districts.

Illinois’s maps were already heavily gerrymandered to favor Democrats, who control 73 of the 118 seats in the House and 41 of 59 in the Senate. But Democrats are worried a GOP wave in the 2022 midterm elections could defeat Gov. J.B. Pritzker. They want to shore up their supermajority to ensure they can override a new Republican Governor.

Apologists for the Democrats explain that according to the state constitution the General Assembly needs to have new legislative districts approved by June 30. What they leave out is that if no map is passed, again according to the state constitution, an eight-person bipartisan committee is appointed to redraw maps. Republicans would likely end up in a stronger position in such a scenario because don’t believe it’s possible to create an even more unfair map.

What’s worse about these new legislative districts is because of the COVID-19 epidemic, not all of the US Census numbers have been released. Illinois Democrats based their new state House and Senate districts on projections from American Community Survey, not hard numbers. 

When confronted about gerrymandering by Fox Chicago’s Mike Flannery on this weekend’s Flannery Fired Up, Boss Michael Madigan’s slippery successor as state House Speaker, Chris Welch, explained to the host that Oklahoma, a red state, also based their remapping on ACS data. 

True–only that Welch neglected to mention that Oklahoma is committed to redraw its maps once the final Census numbers are in.

Illinois, because of population loss, will have one less congressional seat after the 2022 midterm elections. Federal guidelines on congressional districts are quite strict–so the new congressional maps have not been released as the Illinois Democrats await those hard numbers to crunch and torture. But speculation is that these maps will also punish the GOP. 

One-party Democratic rule has destroyed Illinois. I’ve noted these facts many times at Da Tech Guy. Illinois’ public-worker pension plans are among the worst-funded in the nation. The average percentage in state budgets dedicated to pensions is four percent. In Illinois, because its promises to these liberal public-sector unions were not properly funded, it is 25 percent. The state’s repupation for corruption is well known–in my lifetime four governors, three Democrats and one Republican, have served time in federal prison. Federal authorites have been investigating the inner circle of Boss Madigan for several years. And for the first time in history Illinois lost population between Censuses. 

Every state will be redrawing their maps. Former president Barack Obama and his first attorney general, Eric Holder founded a group, the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, that opposes Republican gerrymandering. Look for the two of them to holler and scream when they declare new red state remaps to be unfair. Of course Obama and Holder will be mum on gerrymandering in blue states, such as what occurs every ten years in Obama’s home state. 

What do you do if a liberal moans to you about those red state district maps that they say are gerrymandered? I have a three word reply for you. 

“What about Illinois?”

John Ruberry regularly blogs from Illinois at Marathon Pundit.

Update: (DTG) Welcome Liberty Daily readers. Take a peek around. See Jake Tapper’s Dilemma, read about Russia and the Arctic and find out what happens when people discover what everyone already knows.

Oh and don’t forget this month’s Indulgence Calendar or the latest podcast.

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