Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm • Hacker News Board

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#131

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:36 PM UTC

WildUtah wrote: post #81

nickff wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The intent of the Senate was to preserve the independence and influence of the states. If you splitline-partition the country, you are eliminating the means of achieving this goal, and it would be simpler to abolish the Senate. It can be argued that the current system of directly electing Senators has already made the institution unrepresentative of the interests of the state governments, but your proposal would furt…

There is no constitutional provision that would ever allow abolishing the Senate. The Constitution of the USA prohibits any amendment that could change the disproportionality of the Senate.

It prohibits an amendment to eliminate the equal representation of States in the Senate, but it does not prohibit either of:

1. An amendment eliminating all actual powers of the Senate, either with our workout creating some new body to which those powers are transferred, or

2. An amendment eliminating the restriction on amendments eliminating the equal representation of States in the Senate.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#132

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:45 PM UTC

specialist wrote: post #10

dragonwriter wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Isn't gerrymandering a much more complex problem than that makes it out to be? No, its vastly simpler: the problem with gerrymandering is that there is no good way to draw single-member winner-take-all districts, and the solution is just don't do that . Multimember districts with a system that provides proportional representation within each district (e.g., five-member districts with STV) solve the problem pretty m…

Agreed. But even when the USA sees the light on proportional representation, there will continue to be winner takes all elections. Executive positions (president, governor, mayor), senators, judges, ballot issues, etc. In those cases, approval voting is the correct answer. Easy to explain, easy to tabulate, most mathematically fair, hardest to game. Per Duvenger's Law, approval voting would probably also help replace…

I see no appeal in proportional representation. The idea that I can only vote for a party, and that they get to choose which people actually hold those seats... it is repulsive and sickening.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#133

Post by BurningFrog » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:48 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #65

ClayShentrup wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Algorithmic line-drawing of single-member winner-take-all district pretty much guarantees poorly-representative districts A) The status quo is massive Gerrymandering, so something like the Shortest Splitline Algorithm would be a massive improvement. B) The point is not to make quasi-proportional-representation with districts. The point is to make a legislature whose laws are representative. To that end, it does not…

No line drawing method on single member districts does that, and the best way to get laws which represents e people effectively is by assuring better proportionality. This had, in fact, been studied quite a bit, see, e.g., Arend Lijphart's Patterns of Democracy . Mucking around with variations on how our by whom lines are drawn for single-member, plurality or majority runoff districts and thinking that that had some…

"Perfect enemy of the good" fallacy, if that's a thing.

Gerrymandering can add ~30% of representatives for the party controlling it, so changing it to a party method does improve things a lot, even if it is arguably very far from perfect.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#134

Post by panglott » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:49 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #40

Turing_Machine wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But even when the USA sees the light on proportional representation" "Sees the light"? Proportional representation is far from a panacea. It tends to lead to a fragmented government (which is usually bad). It also privileges party over individual candidates (which can be good or bad, but those who dislike partisanship would certainly disapprove). There are other factors at play as well. Most (in)famously, the Weimar…

> Proportional representation is far from a panacea. Among modern, established democracies, proportionality of representation is pretty closely linked to public satisfaction with government, and public participation with government. Its as close to a panacea for effective democracy as you could have -- which isn't surprising, proportionality of representation is a pretty direct measure of the extent to which a govern…

> proportionality of representation is pretty closely linked to public satisfaction with government, and public participation with government.

Is the causal relationship really that proportional representation drives political representation and satisfaction?

Democracies with a high level of political participation may be likelier to adopt experiments like proportional representation...and then public satisfaction is driven by the high level and effectiveness of political participation.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#135

Post by JDDunn9 » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:53 PM UTC

randcraw wrote: post #125

JDDunn9 wrote: post #77

Gerrymandering gets attention because it is malicious misrepresentation, but unintentional misrepresentation is just as bad. Voting is a flawed system that will always give some voters more voice than others. - The people who voted for the loser will not be represented (one of the reasons minorities are underrepresented). - The need of local representation is illusory. Make a list of all the political issues you care…

Gerrymandering applies as much to local school, county, and state districts as it does federal districts. At the school and county and state level, all issues are local. In fact, most legislation that has a large tangible effect on your kids, your home, and your job occurs locally, not federally.

The Federal government makes decisions for the entire nation. State-specific issues should not make their way into Congress.

State issues are likewise at the state level. There is no reason to make sure two counties are represented, since they won't get separate laws/taxes.

All that matters is that the people being affected by the laws are equally represented. That cannot happen with districting.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#136

Post by hackeraccount » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:54 PM UTC

saryant wrote: post #67

teslaberry wrote: post #66

gerry mandering is a symptom of democracy not the problem. democracy is the problem, or rather it is a form of self governance which presents many dillemas. historically , we know the bigger and more mature a democracy gets , the more it ages into socially defunct patterns of corruption , lowest common denominator, the decay of ethics, and embedded social passivity. the solution to 'gerrymandering' is the end of our…

And replace it with what?

Duh. Something better.*

*"better" is left as an exercise for the reader. I have a better solution but the margins of this textbox don't provide enough room for it.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#137

Post by pc86 » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:58 PM UTC

WildUtah wrote: post #79

powera wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, you can't gerrymander Senate seats. (it's not representative now, but it's not changing either)

North and South Dakota are two states instead of one so that Republicans could have an extra two senators. Hawai'i and Alaska were admitted to the Union together so that neither party would gain an advantage in the Senate from the addition. So yes, you can gerrymander Senate seats. It's just harder and less reliable than House seats.

If you're willing to change the definition of the word gerrymander, sure.

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#138

Post by hackeraccount » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 2:58 PM UTC

davidw wrote: post #58

dragonwriter wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Proportional representation is far from a panacea. Among modern, established democracies, proportionality of representation is pretty closely linked to public satisfaction with government, and public participation with government. Its as close to a panacea for effective democracy as you could have -- which isn't surprising, proportionality of representation is a pretty direct measure of the extent to which a govern…

Italy and Israel are two countries that have had very proportional systems in recent time frames. Having lived in Italy, I am not that impressed by the politics there, and think that proportional representation with party lists is part of the problem. I think STV is pretty interesting, but producing one winner is no bad thing either. Of course, as per Arrow, nothing is perfect.

How on earth can it be that yours is the only reference to Arrow?

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#139

Post by pc86 » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 3:00 PM UTC

Bud wrote: post #106

rmc wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder is this one reason some in the US Establishment are opposed to Peuto Rico being a state? Since it would probably be 2 Democrats?

There is no question about it. Same with the District of Columbia and various other places that should arguably already be states. They'd be likely to provide Democratic Senators, so there is a gigantic roadblock to keep this from happening.

It's more difficult to make an argument against Puerto Rican statehood, but DC is expressly not a state, and should either remain a federal district with no voting representation or be part of Maryland (as stated elsewhere).

Re: Gerrymandering and a cure for it – the shortest splitline algorithm

#140

Post by Retra » Wed, Sep 30, 2015, 3:02 PM UTC

SapphireSun wrote: post #60

Retra wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't know enough to have an opinion on this matter, but I also don't see the substance of your argument. If you flip a fair coin twice, you might get two heads. That doesn't mean the coin isn't fair; fairness is a property gleaned of repeating the trial many times. So over many elections, the aggregate result would be fair.

That's true, but every time an individual result is unfair... it's still unfair. If I live on the red side and there are two blue reps, I have literally no representation despite comprising 50% of the population. The fact that I sometimes get to sock it to the blue side with two red reps is unfair to them. This isn't a case of turnabout is fair play, as the promise of representative government is that everyone gets a…

It sounds like you are confusing "everyone gets a vote" with "everyone gets a result." If you're the only red person in a room of blues, there's no way it's going to be fair unless you can convince others to turn, or you run away. A voting system is not meant to make everything possible, but to make it so that the one red in the room has an out: get more votes. (Because without something, you've got a very volatile situation.) You have a voice, it's just not codified in your vote unless you're a near majority.

The point of voting isn't to get fair representation. You can't have fair representation in this sense due to the Pigeon-Hole principle. You can have it in a long term, systemic sense.

    every time an individual result is unfair... it's still unfair

Fairness is not a property of individual results. It's a property of a statistical system incorporating many data points.