Thursday, July 07, 2011

"How the Wyoming legislature became a valley floor filled with dry bones"

Former Democratic state legislator and minister Rodger McDaniel takes on the legislative redistricting process (a.k.a. gerrymandering) in his most recent column. I hadn't thought of the Wyoming Legislature as a valley floor filled with dry bones, but I don't know Biblical references as Rodger does. Other analogies come to mind when I consider the most recent legislative session. Tower of Babel. Mad Hatter's Tea Party -- or maybe another kind of Tea Party. Scenes from "The Crucible."

Excerpts from Rodger's blog post:
The huge one-Party majority in the legislature is not so much about political ideology as it is about the structure incumbents created to protect themselves from competition. The proof is in the extraordinarily high numbers of those incumbents who are never opposed at the ballot box.
Nationwide, the last election saw 28% of all state senate winners unopposed. In Wyoming it was 60%. On the house side, a third of all members nationwide won without an opponent. In Wyoming it was almost 70%.

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