#rsrh America’s most technically skilled politician in danger?

I refer, of course, to Dennis Kuchinich; a man who has managed to spend the last fourteen years and two Presidential elections as a household name and respected* figure in American politics, despite the fact that by any objective standard he is a dead ringer for a Keebler Elf having a midlife crisis.

Seriously:

Tell me that you don’t want to score some tollhouse cookies off of the guy.  Tell me.  Yet he thrives in our political environment, with power, money, and marriage levels… somewhat above what one might expect.  I say this respectfully; Kuchinich, like the World War II Canadians, punches above his weight class.  That’s something to respect, even if he’s a dolt in terms of his political views.

Unfortunately for him, he’s a Democrat with the bad luck to be in a currently Republican-controlled state that’s on the verge of losing two Congressional Districts.  The map Newsweek provided is missing a couple of important details, so here’s one of the 2010 Ohio results:

Newsweek is trying to shade scenarios involving the lost seats in ways that might impact Republicans, but honestly this is not going to be difficult.  Marcia Fudge in the 11th District has a majority-minority district: she’s perfectly safe.  So the Ohio legislature combines Nancy Kaptur’s 9th with Kuchinich’s 10th, and Betty Sutton’s 13th with Tim Ryan’s 17th, then trim off the excess and throw it to either Bob Latta’s 5th and/or Steve LaTourette’s 14th.  Smooth out the rest, and lo! – problem solved, and there’s the added bonus of watching four liberal Democrats slice each other up for two seats.

Mind you, there’s probably five good reasons why the above scenario won’t work.  Still: something to look forward to, right?

*For given values of “respected,” of course.  Still, he was able to go into Presidential debates and not be immediately accosted and shaken down for baked goods, so clearly he’s got that.

2 thoughts on “#rsrh America’s most technically skilled politician in danger?”

  1. Actually, it’s more likely that Fudge’s district will move Westward and take in the most Democratic part of his district (the city of Cleveland). Fudge’s district lost alot of people over the last decade, and it needs to take in some blacks to keep in minority-majority. The only place nearby with any blacks to give is west Cleveland, without which Kucinich’s District is significantly more competitive, and it was only D + 8 to begin with.

    Most likely, the 9th with take parts of Lorain county from the 13th, the 17th (the other big loser) will take some more Liberal parts of Akron, and we’ll see a 10th district that comprises of the west Cleveland suburbs and the more suburban/Republican parts of the current 13th around Akron.

    In other words, we lose 1 Republican district (somewhere else in the state) and one Democratic district, but make 1 of the Democrat’s districts far more competitive than Kucinich can hold. Throw in that he’ll probably beat Betty Sutton in a primary (he is a darling of the Hard Left) and you could have a situation where we hold 2 of the 3 Cleveland districts, and hold a 13-3 edge in the Congressional delegation while giving our marginal seats a little boost.

  2. Thanks for putting me some knowledge. I am now going to really enjoy some of the redistricting fights. The howls and shrieks of Democrats are always so melodic and soothing.

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