Typing through the tears...

We woke up this morning to find this heart-rending story of political gamesmanship, gamesmanship which has "cost" the United States Government the continuing "service" of Barney Frank. Poor Barney...

US Representative Barney Frank yesterday accused Beacon Hill lawmakers of drawing the new congressional map in a way that shortchanged him in favor of fellow congressmen Edward J. Markey and Stephen F. Lynch. Had they done otherwise, said Frank, he might have run again.

‘‘Markey and Lynch were protected, and the rest of us got what they didn’t want,’’ he said. Losing the chance to pick up some choice suburban towns for his district, Frank said, retirement became a more attractive option...On redistricting, Frank said he spoke with legislative leaders at the State House several weeks ago about the new lines for the Fourth Congressional District, to which he was first elected in 1980. They wanted him to take a reshaped district grounded in Southern Massachusetts, centered away from his base of Newton and Brookline. He rejected that idea, he said, but still ended up with a district that "unpleasantly surprised" him..."I talked to Ed Markey, and frankly I was a little disappointed there," said Frank. "I think Ed had some influence with them, but it was spent mostly on his own district.

"There was stuff that Eddie got that, if I could have shared some with Eddie, it would have been a better district."

I'm sorry, did I say "heart-rending"? I meant, of course, "heart-warming". And the tears are of laughter.

Oh, and what about Ed Markey's influence on the process? What was he looking for?

"My influence was to ask that all nine districts be Democratic districts, and independent analysts are concluding that all nine are safe Democratic seats," Markey said.

Yeah, I bet they are. No reason for Republicans in Massachusetts to have any shot at actual representation.



So let me talk, a little bit, about something that I found very discouraging in November of 2010. Some of you may remember my reaction to the elections, which produced such "great" results for Republicans nationwide. ("I'm sitting here in Massachusetts this morning, and "disappointed" doesn't even begin to describe how I'm feeling...") Well, in some ways, Republicans had a good decent night in Massachusetts, too. But not good enough to actually produce any electoral victories. There was a lot of enthusiasm among Massachusetts Republicans. There were a lot of votes. And there were a lot of losses.

Obviously, Massachusetts is a heavily Democratic state. But, it's also a heavily gerrymandered state. (As it's also the state where the GerryMander first got it's name, when Governor Elbridge Gerry signed a controversial redistricting plan in 1812, I suppose that's not inappropriate...)

And the current proposed map is no less contorted. No doubt they've managed to put together a plan in which all nine seats will go to the Democrats in 2012. Easy enough to do given the majority they've got, but there are certainly enough Republicans in the state for at least a couple of "fair" or competitive districts. If, you know, anyone were interested in something like that.

And what's the impact of all of the gerrymandering? Well, the more of it that gets done, the bigger the disparity between the minority party vote share and the minority party seat share. Here's a table showing what happened in 2010.

Massachusetts Republicans - 2010 Election

	% of vote	% of seats
Governor	41.59%	00.00%
US Representative	34.84%	00.00%
State Senate	31.42%	10.20%
State Representative	25.16%	20.30%

(While the Republican percentage varied from office to office, the Democratic percentage didn't change much, from 54% of the State Senate vote to about 58% for the Governor's race and the State and US House races. There were a lot of 3rd party votes and, particularly for the lower races, unopposed candidates where there were a great many blank ballots.)

Now, there's only one governor's office, so that's included mostly for informational purposes. On statewide races, the Republicans can, fairly often, come up with 35-40 percent of the vote, and, in the right circumstances, even win the Governorship. But it's interesting to note what happens in the rest of the categories. First off, in the state rep races, the districts are all small enough that there's not really a lot of room for extensive gerrymandering. In those races, the percentage of the Republican vote is fairly close to the percentage of the races that they won. (Pitiably small percentages, obviously.) In the State Senate races, where the effects of partisan districting really start to show up, the Republicans won 31% of the vote and only 10% of the seats. The Democrats won 90% of the seats with 54% of the vote. And in the US House races, where they can get very artistic, the Democrats beat the Republicans by 58%-35%, and took all ten (100%) of the seats in the process. So, despite the fact that the Republicans took 35% of the vote to the Democrats 58%, there continues to be no representation of Republican Massachusetts taxpayers in the United States House of Representatives. And the system is rigged to prevent them from getting any in the next election, either.

This is not new, of course. Nor is it particularly partisan - in places where Republicans control the process, no doubt there are similar effects.

But is it good for anyone? Other than the politicians themselves, of course? It's not at all obvious to me that it is. Of course, since the people that benefit are the people that are doing it, it's not at all clear what mechanism could possibly force a change in the practice, either...

Just beat it, Barney!

Michael Graham:

The open secret is that, as a congressman, Barney Frank has been wrong about almost every major policy in his long public career. From Reaganomics to Obamacare, his predictions of future performance have been wildly, embarrassingly off the mark. When he’s attempted to lead, he’s almost always taken off in the worst direction.

Amen, brother...

An early Christmas present...

...for the entire country. U.S. Rep. Barney Frank will not seek re-election

Longtime U.S. Rep. Barney Frank won’t be running for re-election in 2012 ending an often controversial but always outspoken tenure.

Frank, 71, has served in Congress since 1980. He will take questions about his decision to relinquish his seat at 1 p.m. today at Newton City Hall, his office told the Herald.

Earlier would have been better, of course, as Frank's fingerprints are all over the housing bubble that is largely responsible for the crash of 2008, but hey - better late than never. If there's one thing that the US body politic desperately needs, it's fewer and better Barney Franks...

The Barney Shuffle

The Barney Shuffle



Go Sean Bielat.

If I had the power to choose one house race that I got to decide the result in, it would be this one, which isn't even my own. But there may not be a better representative of the Democrats' feckless fiscal policy and arrogance while implementing it than Barney Frank, and he's the one member of the House that I'd most like to see gone.

Let’s Regulate Barney Frank’s Pay

A great suggestion from David Boaz:

Since Barney Frank entered Congress, federal spending has risen from $590 billion in 1980 to $3.7 trillion this year. The annual deficit has risen from $74 billion to $1.5 trillion. Gross federal debt rose from $909 billion to $13.8 trillion — and to over $15 trillion next year. And all this without a major war or depression during those 30 years.


Maybe we should adjust pay practices for members of Congress to give them an incentive to avoid risky, unaffordable, out-of-control borrowing and spending.

Brown a no on "financial reform" bill

According to Sissy Willis,

Scott Brown "has listened to his constituents," an aide in our junior Senator's office just told us, and will definitely vote "no" on the Dodd-Frank Financial Reform bill should it come to the floor.

This is a good thing. Now, honesty compels me to admit that I don't know exactly what this bill would do¹. But it can almost always be truthfully said of anything that, if Chris Dodd and Barney Frank and Barack Obama are fer it, I'm agin it. So, Go Scott! Vote no! Kill that sucker!


¹ - Of course, neither do its authors. They just think that they do.

These truths should be self-evident

This is the kind of thing that should go without saying.

if you own even modest assets (a small house, a savings account) and you think that in a battle between the political class and the business class it's in your interest for the latter to lose, you're a fool who entirely deserves the vaporization of his wealth on which Barney Frank & Co have embarked.

Unfortunately, not only does it need to be said, there is a substantial percentage, if not an absolute majority, of people in this country that does not understand it to be true.

On "homophobia"

Earlier today, Ed Whelan, in the Corner, took note of Congressman Barney Frank's casual slander of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia:

Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank...was discussing gay marriage and his expectation that the high court would some day be called upon to decide whether the Constitution allows the federal government to deny recognition to same-sex marriages.

"I wouldn't want it to go to the United States Supreme Court now because that homophobe Antonin Scalia has too many votes on this current court," said Frank.

Whelan later followed up:

In response to my criticism of the term “homophobe,” Andrew Sullivan asks: “[D]oes Ed Whelan believe that anti-gay animus doesn't exist? If so, what would he call it, if not homophobia? Seriously: is there a better term?”

For Frank and Sullivan, obviously not. It's the perfect term. It allows them to accuse anyone who disagrees with them on any aspect of the political "homosexual agenda" (whatever that might be) of a mental disorder. A "phobia" is a fear, not a normal fear, but a mental disorder. Allowing them to use "homophobe" or "homophobia" is allowing them to accuse their political opponents of a mental disorder. Of course Sullivan and Frank want to use "homophobe."

The rest of us ought not let them.

Meltdown

If we had a legitimate news media in this country, people would know these things. But we don't - we have a propaganda arm of the Democratic party, so Chris Dodd and Barney Frank and John Kerry and Barack Obama can shamelessly blame George W. Bush for their destruction of the banking system and never get called on it by the fourth estate. Thank God for the internet...