G is for gerrymander.

G

gerrymander • 'jĕ-rē-man-dər 

verb [portmanteau of (Eldridge) Gerry, Massachusetts governor at the time, and salamander, first used in the Boston Gazette, March 26, 1812. See Elkanah Tisdale’s cartoon of the malformed voting district below.]

   1. to cheat opponents out of their congressional seats and the people of a state out of their votes. Methods include cracking, packing, and hijacking.

        synonyms: maddog, strausstumpchoke, tillwidowbird, tuckasplatta

Christopher Ingraham takes a keen look at “American’s most gerrymandered congressional districts” here, explaining along the way how underrepresented Democrats were in the House elected in 2012, “relative to their vote share in [that] election” – some 18 seats!

        “How the Republicans pulled that off was to draw some really funky-looking Congressional districts,” but not to make safe seats for themselves but very safe seats for Democrats. The idea was (and is) to give your opponents districts they can’t lose by squishing as many of their supporters as possible into one or two imaginatively drawn districts, that in turn “lets you spread out your own supporters over a [larger] number of districts. Those districts may not be entirely safe, but they’re “close enough for government work,” you might say.

Here are four of my favorites with new names based on the shape and name of the speaker of the state house at the time.

The Texas 33rd - Joe Straus, Speaker of the House

strausstumpchoke

The North Carolina 4th - Thom Tillis, Speaker of the House

tillwidowbird

The Illinois 4th - Michael Madigan, Speaker of the House

maddog

Louisiana's 2nd- James Wayne "Jim" Tucker, Speaker of the House

tuckasplatta