The governor of North Carolina is calling the Legislature into special session to vote on delaying North Carolina’s primary, currently scheduled in Mid March.
The reason is the Voting Rights Act – a Federal Court threw out the existing maps with the totally bizarre 12th Congressional district, which winds halfway across the state along I-85.
It was drawn to satisfy the requirement to create a majority black congressional district to ensure that 2 blacks would be elected to congress out of the 13 districts – assuming blacks will blindly vote for a black candidate based solely on their skin color.
Well, the 1st Congressional district elected a white Democrat despite the district being majority black. The 12th district, which covers the black part of Charlotte, elected a woman from High Point who has no history of supporting Charlotte’s issues.
So the court has told NC to create majority black districts ignoring the race of the people who live in the district. The proposed map tears up the 12th district and ensures that Charlotte’s blacks will have a black Congress person. Since Alma doesn’t live in Charlotte, she loses her seat.
Absentee balloting is already underway, so those ballots need to be discarded and the entire process start over. The Supreme Court could have prevented the chaos, but the death of Scalia means the court ruling will probably stand.
It’s conceivable the Presidential vote might proceed then the other races be voted in May or June
And the point of individual votes is – what again? Let’s make such a mess out of America that we don’t need to vote anymore. Whoever has the guns and money wins, right? No wonder people like Hillary and Bernie are running. Is Raul Castro available? I know he’s a bit old, but he could create the mold for America’s future leaders.
Martin Luther King Jr. is rolling in his grave. He fought separatism and racism his entire life and he now gets – you guessed it – more separatism and racism. At least it is the Black community that gets to be racist now.
President Obama can ask Raul in person for advice during his upcoming visit to Cuba
NC 1st District Congressman G.K. Butterfield is head of the Congressional Black Caucus (since 2015) and considers himself a black man:
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/10710100/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Butterfield
Don’t I look foolish now?
Thanks!
http://abc11.com/politics/making-sense-of-redrawn-maps-and-shifting-primaries/1205823/
So the plan now is to still hold the primary on March 15th for President and everything else as planned – except Congressional races will be a do over on June 7th, with the March 15th Absentee votes for Congress discarded.
The final vote is Friday, then probably more court battles.
I can’t tell which district I’ll be in within Mecklenburg County. I think this is a much more reasonable map, although it’s pretty clear the intent is to preserve the incumbents except Ms Adams, who finds herself now in district with an incumbent Republican – Iredell County is probably the most Republican county in the state
According to the news story, the claim is being made that a House member doesn’t have to reside in their district, only live in the state. That has to be nonsense otherwise the entire concept of districts is meaningless.
The little pink area is deliberately designed to keep the upscale SouthPark Mall and nearby affluent condos outside of the “black” 12th district, and attach it to a bunch of rural agriculture oriented counties who like Confederate flags
That makes a case for At-large voting- voting for a state’s Congressional representatives in a single election where those getting the most votes represent the state. It has been a common practice but I think most states no longer do it but it appears some such as Wyoming still do. Montana had until 1990 when it lost its second congressional seat and no only has one (by definition at large). It looks like one seat from Vermont is still at-large.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_congressional_districts
That’s exactly the practice that the voting rights act outlaws. If you accept the invalid premise that people will only vote for people of the same race, minority groups get locked out.
For instance, Charlotte City Council has 9 seats. In at large system, with a city that is ~40% black, whites would elect 9 white council members (so the theory goes – ignore that the city elected a black mayor when the city was whiter than today)
So to not be challenged by the Department of Justice, City Council has 5 districts that vote only for their own seat, and 4 at large seats that everyone in the city votes for. City Council has two white Republicans. All 4 “at large” seats are black Democrats – the Democrat is much more significant than the ethnicity in the general election. The black part matters in the primary – while only 40% of the city is black, they’re almost all Demoncrats
Absolutely correct. The proscribed solution to end racial discrimination is “separate but equal” Congressional districts based on race. For you young readers, google “separate but equal” and “race”.
Like radio itself, this blog has no young readers.
Say, that is a real surprise. Radio is the bee’s knees. It’s like cooking with gas. It’s better than sliced bread. Hit that power on that radio, Bugsy!
I will forward the link of this blog to a few twenty-something interns that scurry about the main office of my employer in NOVA. I will tell them to be ready to answer questions for their review.
That should do it,
parrott
The US Supreme Court (Sans Scalia) refused to issue a stay on Friday. The Legislature approved moving the Congressional part of the primary to June 7th using the contingent maps. A court challenge is expected. Democrats have their own set of maps drawn ignoring race in a way that gives a more race based outcome,