There are those people who desperately cling to the concept that the majority of us who despise the concept of “President Donald Trump” will gleefully dump anybody aligned with him.
YET
OTHERS POINT out the fact that various polls show Trump’s unfavorable ratings
only go so low – and that it seems the people who voted for him in 2016 remain
pleased. In large part because they like the idea of the vast majority of us
being offended by his political presence.
There’s
even one political observer who is now saying that if Democrats can’t regain
control of Congress (particularly the U.S. Senate) come November, they, “could
lose Senate control indefinitely.”
A
large part of the issue/problem (depending on how you want to view it) is that
many states have their congressional district boundaries drawn up in ways meant
to favor Republican political establishments.
And
in the states where Democrats prevail (including our beloved own Illinois),
they spew the talk about needing “reform,” which in their view amounts to
dumping Dem (predominantly urban) interests to shift control over to Republican
Party officials.
IT
IS WITH that background in mind that the Supreme Court of the United States was
called upon to rule in some serious cases – with some partisans desperately
hoping the high court would cause the undoing of some of those Republican-leaning
states.
Including
our neighbor to the north in Wisconsin, where I remember it wasn’t all that
long ago the state was viewed as some sort of liberal bastion but now has a
Republican establishment entrenched to the point where no partisan would want
to leave Illinois to go to “the Badger State” – even if they were University of
Wisconsin alumni.
Yet
in the end, the high court made a point of issuing rulings that did little, if
anything, to change things in Wisconsin or Maryland.
It’s almost as if the court, which theoretically has its own 5-4 conservative-leaning majority, did not want to make any radical changes. As if they’re content to let the status quo of politically partisan politics remain.
THE
WISCONSIN CASE is particularly intriguing in that Democrat-aligned political
interests tried suing the state, saying the entirety of the congressional
districts were drawn in ways to ensure some places were so overwhelmingly
Republican and that they’d be the majority – even though places like Milwaukee
and Madison theoretically provide large bases for Democratic Party voters.
The
high court wound up ruling it improper to challenge the state’s whole
composition. Instead, we’d have to have individual lawsuits against each
individual congressional district.
That’s
a lot of legal activity and guaranteed to consume plenty of time. As if the
high court wants to be sure there’s a serious delay before they’re confronted
with having to make a significant ruling on the merits of letting political
parties draw boundaries to favor their own interests.
There
will continue to be cases before the courts, as it appears another case
involving the situation in North Carolina is still pending. But unless we get
some radical change, it is likely that the one thing Trump has going in his side’s
favor is that a majority of the states are rigged in ways to favor those who
believe in this Age of Trump we’re now in.
THE
IDEA THAT a majority of us are appalled by a president who sees nothing wrong
with the conditions that now result in seizing children from their parents as
they try to enter this country may not be enough to dump him.
And
on a more local perspective, keep in mind this issue will be considered key by
some partisans in the Illinois elections this year. Because whoever manages to
win the governor’s post will be the one who gets to preside over the
reapportionment process when Illinois goes through it again in the early 2020s.
I’m sure some Republican-types who might be appalled personally by much of Gov. Bruce Rauner’s behavior will force themselves to vote for him just so he’ll have a “veto” over any Democratic-leaning map the Dem-leaning General Assembly is likely to pass.
Of
course, it will be a Dem-leaning one because of the fact that Chicago’s metropolitan
area comprises about two-thirds of the state’s population – a fact that oft
bothers those in the other third who can’t understand why the whole world can’t
be filled with people just like themselves. Which is actually a too-common
attitude among people who think that all politicians are crooked – except for
theirs!
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