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[Heron TSG]

More helpfully: In essence, banks were betting that loans and mortgages they issued would fail so that they could reap benefits.

[Glowcat]

Today Rachel Maddow did a segment on state-level GOP politics, the effectiveness of gerrymandering, how our representatives aren't representative of the population as a whole, and Republicans attempting to bring their advantage to the national-level. I know we've talked about this sort of thing before but it just occurred to me that this system which grossly favors land over people is racist as shit. Since minority races tend to concentrate in urban districts their votes tend to merely contribute to overkill in a single district, i.e. their votes are disproportionately devalued compared to white people.

Anyone think this might actually be an opening to fix the system?

[Nadaka]

Yes, take humans out of the redistricting process.

Mandate AI based redistricting with optimization for the following qualities only:
equivalent population
continuousness
compactness
smallest number of edges that do not fall on the border of a county/city

[GlyphGryph]

You don't even need AI. There are plenty of simple, straightforward (well, for people who can do math, anyway) and overall fair ways to determine redistricting, that leave so little up to actual human judgement that gerrymandering is impossible.

This is a solved problem.

The reason the solution is not applied, is that the only people that want it applied are the people who currently lack the ability to apply it - and as soon as they gain the ability, they will no longer want to. And if, by chance, they did, and the opposition managed to take back the legislative body for a single election, they could undo it just as quickly, and the party that tried to fix it would have served in arguably making things worse.

There is a single, stable Nash equilibrium, and it's at "gerrymander to all fucks out"

[Grek]

How did it cause the system to collapse?

So here's what happened in simple words anyone can understand:

Glass–Steagall Act was repealled in 1999. This allowed deposit banks (ones where you keep your money) to do pretty much everything that an investment bank (ones that give out big loans and run retirement funds) is allowed to do, where before they weren't allowed to do that. This includes offering lots and lots of people mortgages. A mortgage is where you make a deal with the bank where they give you a big loan, and if you can't pay it off the bank gets your house. Now cut to 2004. Housing prices are going up! Deposit banks start aggressively offering mortgages to people who cannot afford them, hoping that they will be able to foreclose on the houses and get lots of expensive houses cheaply. Over the next two years, 3 million houses get foreclosed upon when people that the banks did not expect to be able to make their mortgage payments are unable to make their mortgage payments - just as planned. The banks start loaning each other money to make even more mortgages, putting up the foreclosed houses as collateral. Now cut to 2006. The housing prices crash unexpectedly. Oh no! The banks are suddenly sitting on a bunch of houses that are no longer worth anything and have loaned out all their money as part of their mortgage deals. The banks, not having any money, are unable to make any more loans or even pay off their loans to eachother. America's economy, needing easy to get loans in order to properly function, suddenly shits bricks as the loans that it needs stop being made.

Now, consider what would happen if the Glass-Steagall Act were still in place. All of those deposit banks, not having been allowed to screw themselves over by buying into the housing bubble, would still have heaps of money to lend out, thereby allowing the economy to recover.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

You don't even need AI. There are plenty of simple, straightforward (well, for people who can do math, anyway) and overall fair ways to determine redistricting, that leave so little up to actual human judgement that gerrymandering is impossible.

The shortest splitline algorithm comes to mind.

[RedKing]

I think the only way you could really make a permanent dent in gerrymandering is to have Congress mandate how redistricting is done for all states, and for them to dictate some kind of computerized system that wouldn't be "open to interpretation".

Unfortunately, since the vast majority of House members (from both parties) owe their perpetual re-elections to gerrymandering, that has only slightly less chance of passing than us seeing Rick Santorum carrying the banner at the next San Francisco Gay Pride Parade while wearing assless chaps.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Looks like we need to go to the Supreme Court, then.

[RedKing]

Looks like we need to go to the Supreme Court, then.

Problem being that by law, redistricting is a state matter. Imposing any kind of Federal solution (including one by the Supreme Court) is a major cession of state power.

The more likely solution is grassroots movements to get referenda, ballot measures, etc. in each state to hand off redistricting to a neutral third-party rather than leaving it with the state legislatures. It's worked in a handful of states so far, but the problem is that some states will NEVER relinquish that power (I'm looking at you, Alabama.)

[Nadaka]

Looks like we need to go to the Supreme Court, then.

Problem being that by law, redistricting is a state matter. Imposing any kind of Federal solution (including one by the Supreme Court) is a major cession of state power.

State power isn't as important as citizen power. And gerrymandering makes the votes of individual citizens unequal for the empowerment of the few.

[Sheb]

Is Citizen power in the Constitution?

[Nadaka]

Is Citizen power in the Constitution?

yes. Its kinda the whole point. And if that isn't enough there is the 10th amendment, which most states rightists ignore the "or to the people" part.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Looks like we need to go to the Supreme Court, then.

Problem being that by law, redistricting is a state matter. Imposing any kind of Federal solution (including one by the Supreme Court) is a major cession of state power.

At the end of the day, the Supreme Court is the highest court in the land and their word is Law, state power notwithstanding.

The more likely solution is grassroots movements to get referenda, ballot measures, etc. in each state to hand off redistricting to a neutral third-party rather than leaving it with the state legislatures. It's worked in a handful of states so far, but the problem is that some states will NEVER relinquish that power (I'm looking at you, Alabama.)

We don't need to hand it over to a "neutral" third-party, we need to hand it over to math, which is incapable of having bias rather than just being disposed against it.

[Descan]

Math is the third party.

CALCULUS 2016

[Darvi]

Yes, CALCULUS/ALGEBRA2016!