Category: News and Opinion

Common Cause has recently released its own “non-partisan” redistricting maps for Congress, State Senate, and State Assembly. Although I liked the idea of possible turnover because some districts would have more than one incumbent while others would have an open seat, the Common Cause maps were not the improvement I hoped they would be otherwise. When I look at Brooklyn, the Common Cause lines are a mess for Congress and to a lesser extent for State Senate. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the Assembly districts seem to be better, because they are smaller.

Perhaps the idea of “community of interest,” specifically based on race, is what is causing the problem. That certainly is what is causing massive gerrymanders in the proposed Common Cause map for Congress. What seems to be happening, in a country with a Black President and a city where there is no “majority” racial group, is integration, particularly among the young. Common Cause finds non-Whites moving in traditionally “White” areas and “Whites” moving into traditionally “Black” areas. And that is a problem for the way districts are thought of, through the eyes of tribalist bigotry. Thus Common Cause ends up with a mandate to create two "Black" districts, each one with a barely a majority for "Blacks," neither of which may still have a majority a few years from now. By dividing the “Black” neighborhoods into two, in fact, there may be no traditional “Black” seat by 2014. So I have another suggestion.

JURASSIC: [Gatemouth said Storobin] "is almost a Russian Al Sharpton, glorifying the primacy of identit