End Rigged Elections

One of my great peeves about our system of elections is the self-dealing way in which election districts are drawn in most states. Being from Iowa, one of a handful of states with a (practically) nonpartisan redistriciting process, I find it odd that our redistricting process is primarily concerned with preventing incumbents from facing competitive elections. Too many voters are stuck with their representatives because the insiders have set up the system to negate performance in favor of powerful, pinpoint computer technology to churn out districts of like-minded constituents. If something similar happened in the private sector, politicans would probably denounce it as a conflict-of-interest. But the redistricting process continues with a wink and a nod. After all, what politician in their right mind is going to force an issue that might put them out of their job?

Iowa also appoints, instead of elects, judges, thereby preventing them from being forced to raise money and pander from the very interests in which they one day may be rendering verdicts. That's a discussion for another day, though.

The New York Times wrote an article a few weeks ago about the growing citizen led effort to change this convoluted process. Here are some sobering facts from the article courtesy of Common Cause (an advocacy group trying to address this issue).

-In the 2004 election cycle, just 13 House seats changed hands
-Only 4 of those 13 was an incumbent losing
-In 2002, 82% of Congressional elections were decided by 20% or more

Nonpartisan redistricting isn't a panacea, however. Two House incumbents in Iowa moved during the 2002 election-cycle so they could run to keep their seats (Iowa's maps can't even take into account where incumbents live). Both won re-election, as did the other two (there wasn't an incumbent in the fifth district). Our current system results in too many politicians that represent the fringes of their respective ideology, leading to a more-divisive and polarizing Washington. Nonpartisan redistricting may have only a small affect on re-election rates, but those who are elected are more reflective and responsive to their constituents (if not, you can bet they'll have the race of their lives in the next election). It isn't surprising to me that Iowa produces moderates like Chuck Grassley and Jim Leach.

Some believe that nonpartisan redistricting isn't enough, as reflected in this article. In this view, voting districts would have to be drawn in such a convoluted manner to obtain cocmpetitiveness they'd look absurd, not to mention artificially divide areas into disparate and unrelated communities. The solution? Proportional elections, where any candidate that surpasses a certain threshold wins. This would mean fewer districts electing multiple representatives - for example, instead of electing 10 House members from 10 districts, you'd elect 5 from 2 districts, with the top five vote getters in each district winning. At least an idea worth exploring.