BCT Editorial – 2/18/07

This page was last updated on February 21, 2007.

True reform; Editorial; Beaver County Times; February 18, 2007.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“Lawmakers have a chance to show Pennsylvania residents about how serious they are about reforming the way state government operates.

“On Tuesday, a group of House lawmakers proposed changing the way in which legislative and congressional districts are drawn up. Their intent is to get away from runaway gerrymandering that makes a mockery of our representative democracy.

“At the press conference, state Rep. Daylin Leach, D-Montgomery, said what we have said in previous editorials on redistricting, that ‘voters are no longer picking their politicians; their politicians are picking their voters.’

“That’s because computer technology allows legislative and congressional districts to be fine tuned to the point where they make an incumbent virtually unbeatable or give one party a decided registration edge over the other.

“One consequence of modern-day gerrymandering is the polarization of government, especially the legislative branch. Incumbents in gerrymandered districts know that winning their party’s primary is tantamount to winning the election.

“They also know that to win that primary, they must appeal to their party’s base, which often is more conservative or liberal than the general populace.

“The big losers are centrists, independents and the nation as a whole. Centrists and independents are the weights that keep our system of representative democracy government from tipping too far to the left or too far to the right. Their concerns aren’t being heard because elected officials don’t have to listen to them.”

[RWC] As a reminder, when a Times editorial refer to “centrists” (or moderates, et cetera), it really means liberals.

In an example I’ve cited before, the Times refers to Sen. Joe Lieberman (CT) as being in the center despite him being the Democrat VP candidate in 2000 and a 2005 Americans for Democratic Action voting record of 94%. The American Conservative Union (ACU) gave Sen. Lieberman a 2005 rating of 8%.

Finally, editorials never tell us what principles these so-called “centrists” stand for.

“Changing the way legislative and congressional districts are drawn up won’t be easy. In addition to opposition within the Legislature, the process itself is long and complicated because it involves amending the state constitution.

“This measure will be a canary-in-a-coal-mine way to measure how committed the Legislature is to true reform. If it survives, it will show that lawmakers are dedicated to reviving representative democracy.

“If it dies, it will show that despite all the talk about reform, it’s still business as usual in Harrisburg.”