TOPEKA — Three federal judges on Tuesday ordered Kansas to cover $389,000 worth of attorneys’ fees and expenses for individuals involved in a lawsuit last year that stemmed from the Legislature’s inability to redraw political bounda…

As always, my helpful, free alternative is at http://bdistricting.com/2010/KS/

Party line vote (Democrats win this one), accusations of gerrymandering, a map with lots of fiddly squiggly bits. The usual.

Virginia Republicans are attempting a new round of gerrymandering just a couple months after the first election on new maps. Apparently the new maps aren’t gerrymandered enough. For bonus points they did this on inauguration day while the news was focused elsewhere and perhaps more importantly while an opposing vote in the state senate was away in Washington DC.

The mid-term redistricting in Texas in 2003 was brazen and offensive but this really takes it to a new level and outrages my cynical heart.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/21/1180936/-While-You-Were-Out-Virginia-Senate-Republicans-pull-redistricting-coup?detail=hide

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/22/virginia-redistricting-henry-marsh_n_2523818.html

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2013/01/republicans-dirty-trick-inauguration.php?ref=fpb

Fed up with expense and delay, State Senator O’Neill to propose independent commission reform bill.

This … recalculates the 2012 Pennsylvania election for House of Representatives using alternative districts. Using the algorithmically derived districts from B-Districting that are purely population-based, it calculates an outcome of 9 Republican representatives and 9 Democratic representatives. The actual outcome was 13 Rep. and 5 Dem., even though the Democratic candidates received over 70,000 more votes as a whole.

pretty good analysis. I have some other things in mind I’d like to check, like the sum national popular vote for congress (not using the presidential race as a proxy for that).

51.4% of the vote for congress, 12/16 seats.

53% and 51% of popular vote for state Senate/House became 62% and 64% of seats. Maybe we should just chuck redistricting for a Proportional Representation scheme.

“2,701,820 Pennsylvanians voted for a Democrat for Congress compared to 2,626,995 who voted for a Republican …” “… Republicans now hold an impressive 13 of Pa.’s 18 congressional seats.”