Redistricting Redux

The Supremes heard the Texas redistricting case today, and I have to say I'm not hopeful. Justices hear Texas redistricting arguments. Though it's hard to make predictions, it sounds like the justices were unmoved by arguments that the process was politically motivated. Listen to this passage:

"That's a surprise," Justice Antonin Scalia joked. "Legislatures redraw the map all the time for political reasons."

But Smith said lawmakers should not be able to get away with drawing oddly shaped districts that protect incumbent Republicans and deny voters their chance to vote for other candidates.

R. Ted Cruz, the Texas solicitor general, told justices that Republicans were only fixing a map that had been drawn to benefit Democrats, despite the fact that the state has more Republican voters.

That's a blatant lie. What ever happened to one man, one vote? The specific intent of this whole exercise was to either dilute or obliterate the votes of progressive and democratic voters in the state of texas. Period. The fact of the matter is that conservative democrats were getting elected in republican districts. And Tom Delay couldn't stand that.

So they came after Austin with a carving knife. The plan was to split up the voters of Travis County and stuff them into suburban, republican districts, effectively wiping them out. If that's not depriving me of my right to representation, I don't know what is.

What makes me angriest is that as a white, middle class manimal, I have no standing whatsoever to sue over this.

They cheat, they lie, they steal, they commit felonies. And they continually get away with it. And if the Roberts court doesn't rubber stamp this, I'll be astonished.