Anti-Climacus

LINKS: It's a great day for me when both Matthew Yglesias and Ted Barlow hit on the very topic I was discussing with the soon-to-depart (for the greener pastures of Princeton) Prof. Achen just yesterday. Allow me to get into full-out contrarian mode:

I think districts which are "gerrymandered" on the basis of political affiliation are a good thing, because they produce more representitve districts than neutral or competitive districts. Look at it this way: if you're a Democrat in a congressional district that swings 60-40 Republican, you're pretty much completely screwed: you might get a candidate who can win once in a great while (unlikely with the advantages afforded to incumbency), but mostly you'll pour lots of energy into electoral campaigns you're going to lose, albeit closely. Whoever wins the district is less likely to listen to you because he/she will be expending all of their energy trying to woo the base of their party (for turnout purposes).

Let's say you live in a 80-20 Republican district. The odds then become much less likely that you're a Democrat, so fewer people on the whole will believe they don't have appropriate representation (on the party level, anyway, and assuming, as I do, that internal differences within parties are largely moot for electoral purposes). For the minority who are of the opposite party, it will obviously not be easy for them to attract attention to their political issues, but, then again, they will be consigned to their fate as electoral losers (and expend less energy there) and more likely to try alternative ways of getting their congressman's attention. Additionally, 80-20 districts open up the possibility of the "One Big Sell," where the candidate agrees to shill for an interest who will foot the bill of their campaigns, and is then free to vote their conscience on a great many more issues than they would be able to if they required the absolute unified support of their party to win.

In conclusion, Congress is a land of contrasts.

Thoughts?