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Sep. 6th, 2013 10:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fredxmertzfrom Dangerousminds.net:
Using the most recent census data, Joe Weisenthal and Walter Hickey at Business Insider have put together the above map that shows how half—HALF!—of the American population lives in just 146 counties!
Something like this goes to show—proves—that the way we apportion our Senators in Washington has become absolutely unworkable. Although it looks like she’s laying a new egg daily, why should a practically empty state like Wyoming get to send some conservative asshole like Liz Cheney to the Senate so that people living in, ahem, the POPULATED areas will have to deal with that nonsense for six years (or longer)? The entire concept of the Senate is getting to become tenuous when you see something like this. Something based on arbitrary state borders? How many states existed with tens of millions of residents when they framed the Constitution?
Visualizing it this way really seals it for me. Unpopulated states simply do not deserve the same Senate representation as the ones where most people live. It’s bullshit. It gives way, way too much influence to places where a close election can be won by a flaming nutcase if the GOP can manage to bus 300 extra octogenarians to voting booths. In California, our two Senators represent 38 million people while Wyoming’s would represent around HALF a million people.
And we know who tends to live in these least populated states…
This is a problem equal to gerrymandering, voter suppression and the Citizens United ruling. Worse, even, in many respects. The electoral college needs to go, too. Now. Perhaps it’s simply time to rethink these matters for the present century—not to mention the country—that we actually live in. That shouldn’t prove controversial, now, should it?
I crack myself up, sometimes…
Via Business Insider, where you can read a list of the 146 counties that half of Americans call home.
http://dangerousminds.net/comments/mindblowing_half_of_the_united_states_population_lives
Davy Jones' Locker Combo at super secret event saturday, after I get off work? we'll play at about 11, other acts include Barin Ake & The Fmaily Mullet, Bomb Pots, Le Petit Morte.
Booked October 27th at Cozmik Pizza, Forward Foundation Fundraiser w/ DJLC, Effies, Cash Only.
Using the most recent census data, Joe Weisenthal and Walter Hickey at Business Insider have put together the above map that shows how half—HALF!—of the American population lives in just 146 counties!
Something like this goes to show—proves—that the way we apportion our Senators in Washington has become absolutely unworkable. Although it looks like she’s laying a new egg daily, why should a practically empty state like Wyoming get to send some conservative asshole like Liz Cheney to the Senate so that people living in, ahem, the POPULATED areas will have to deal with that nonsense for six years (or longer)? The entire concept of the Senate is getting to become tenuous when you see something like this. Something based on arbitrary state borders? How many states existed with tens of millions of residents when they framed the Constitution?
Visualizing it this way really seals it for me. Unpopulated states simply do not deserve the same Senate representation as the ones where most people live. It’s bullshit. It gives way, way too much influence to places where a close election can be won by a flaming nutcase if the GOP can manage to bus 300 extra octogenarians to voting booths. In California, our two Senators represent 38 million people while Wyoming’s would represent around HALF a million people.
And we know who tends to live in these least populated states…
This is a problem equal to gerrymandering, voter suppression and the Citizens United ruling. Worse, even, in many respects. The electoral college needs to go, too. Now. Perhaps it’s simply time to rethink these matters for the present century—not to mention the country—that we actually live in. That shouldn’t prove controversial, now, should it?
I crack myself up, sometimes…
Via Business Insider, where you can read a list of the 146 counties that half of Americans call home.
http://dangerousminds.net/comments/mindblowing_half_of_the_united_states_population_lives
Davy Jones' Locker Combo at super secret event saturday, after I get off work? we'll play at about 11, other acts include Barin Ake & The Fmaily Mullet, Bomb Pots, Le Petit Morte.
Booked October 27th at Cozmik Pizza, Forward Foundation Fundraiser w/ DJLC, Effies, Cash Only.
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Date: 2013-09-07 06:42 pm (UTC)We've overcome that with networks of special interests and a tax scheme that gives a centralized government enough money to dictate policy. That's ok when it comes to social issues as the Fed has been far more protective of rights than the states (oops except for everything to do with communication or drugs). Fiscally it's a wreck, but one a bunch of people with short-term interests keep grabbing short-term votes on.
The "term limits make the legislature worse than corporate dividend rushes" argument is a whole 'nuther can of worms.
Just interesting to see how much power there is in Podunk
Date: 2013-09-09 03:57 pm (UTC)Re: Just interesting to see how much power there is in Podunk
Date: 2013-09-09 04:24 pm (UTC)