Addition By Division

Now that the idea of DC statehood has been brought to the forefront again (with a bill in Congress and everything), the ideas from the fringe have come bubbling back to the surface. Unlike most times in the past, there seems to be some momentum here, so we need to dig into the one that has the most potential of being a huge cluster that will cause the most harm.

Fringe Democrats, who love to do electoral math on the back of a used cocktail napkin when they aren't trying to end run the Constitution by ending the Electoral College completely, have come up with the brilliant idea of adding DC and Puerto Rico as states and splitting large Democrat strongholds such as California into multiple states, thereby adding more Democrats to the US Senate. For this editorial, I'll be focusing on the new states idea.

As I said in my teaser on Facebook, before you drop the nukes, you better know which way the wind is blowing, otherwise the fallout will be much worse on your side. Sure, you could bust up California and make a couple new Democratic strongholds, but if the right has the testicular fortitude (stick taps to Mick Foley for the phrase) to do the same, the Republicans stand to come out much better in both chambers of Congress.

We'll start with the most obvious one, Alaska. Alaska, far and away, has the most land available to carve new states out of. Because of Constitutional requirements, each new state created will receive two senators and one representative. Taking into consideration the voting patterns of Alaska, it is safe to say any new congressional members and senators will likely be Republican. Even though this entire endeavor is an exercise in petty vindictiveness, we'll be nice and only chop Alaska in half. That is two new senators and one new representative for the Republicans.

Next up are Wyoming and Montana. Here we have two more deep red states that can easily be cut in half to generate new senators and representatives for the GOP. There is a bit of a Democrat presence in and around Jackson Hole, WY, but if the lines are drawn correctly, the effect of that could be reduced. Montana did recently have a Democratic governor, but a Montana Democrat is a completely different animal than a coastal Democrat. Still, the likelyhood of the new delegation being Republican is quite high.

That ends the super easy options. The next deep red state that could be divided is Idaho. As they already have more than one congressional district, it would be easy to divide the state along the congressional district line. No new house members, but two new, likely Republican senators.

Next, we have a couple of states that, on their face, aren't real likely candidates, but they are possible. Washington and Oregon are always reliably blue, but once you get out of the population bases in the eastern parts of the state, they become various shades of red. You could easily take Washington's 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 8th congressional districts and form a pretty solid red state with two new Republican senators. The same goes for Oregon. The second congressional district is pretty solidly Republican, so looping that district off into its own state would give an additional two Republican senators.

Which brings us to Texas. Texas is unique. Not only is Texas likely to tell the rest of us to pound sand and become its own country, the desire to break it up into multiple states isn't real likely. However, if it does become an option, you could easily create four states from Texas. Unfortunately, due to the makeup of the state, you would only get two reliably red states (based on congressional district makeup), one tossup, and one fairly blue state. The details of which are a bit complicated and I won't get into it here (I can detail it if you wish via email. Just shoot me a line at: tjsharky39@gmail.com) but I will say that they are created along congressional district lines and are common sense lines.

I am neither advocating for nor will support any idea that involves creating new states simply for political gains. I think it is gerrymandering by the party who screams about gerrymandering every time things aren't drawn to their advantage. This is merely to show that with the proper desire and motivation, any advances gained by adding blue states can be matched or exceeded by red additions. It is a dumb idea that needs to be put to rest. Besides, it isn't constitutional to make DC a state, but when has the Constitution ever stopped a motivated liberal?