Tired of hyperpartisanship? Redistricting could be key

Barack Obama laments it. Former congressmen denounce it. And a majority of Americans say they're annoyed by it: Partisan bickering in Washington.

So is there any way to stymie the trend?

According to the president, one key is redistricting. "We've got a lot of districts that are so safe — 90 percent Democrat or 90 percent Republican — that that also helps to polarize the electorate," Obama told host Jon Stewart during an interview last week on "The Daily Show."

State elected officials will get the next round of redistricting will under way in 2011 — and on Tuesday, millions of voters will set the stage for that process as they cast ballots for legislative races across the country.

After the U.S. Census produces new population numbers every 10 years, political bodies draw up new boundaries for congressional and legislative districts. The process varies state to state, but in many, the party that controls the state legislature and/or the governorship heads up the redistricting plan.

Redistricting normally involves the practice of "gerrymandering" — i.e., deliberately skewing the demographic makeup of a district to favor the interests of the party in charge of the redistricting process. That sort of back-room political fixing is what produces most of the "safe" districts the president lamented on "The Daily Show." Safer districts mean less competition and less electoral incentive for lawmakers to compromise once they're in Washington, Obama suggests.

Meanwhile, to judge by opinion polls, Americans are none too pleased with the political outcome of partisan-minded redistricting. Eighty-two percent of Americans this spring said they were fed up with partisan bickering, a jump from 77 percent in 2005, according to Fox News poll comparisons.

Voters also tell pollsters that they want to use their vote in tomorrow's 2010 midterm contests to send lawmakers the message that they need to reach across the aisle to work productively with their ideological rivals. Democrats and Independents cited such cooperation as Congress's chief order of business after jobs and the economy, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC poll. Republicans listed that as a third-place priority after "returning to the principles of the Constitution."

Of the 50 governor seats, 37 are up for election tomorrow, and many of the major races are still regarded as toss-ups in the run up to Election Day: In Florida, Democrat Alex Sink and Republican Rick Scott are battling for the state's top job; the White House has made a priority of the race in Ohio between Gov. Ted Strickland and Republican challenger John Kasich; Massachusetts has a tight three-way race; and many others are hotly contested.

Prognosticators see Republicans easily picking up seats in Kansas, Tennessee, Wyoming and Oklahoma, for example, and expect the party to come out on top overall in gubernatorial races after Election Day.

Republicans are also poised to make gains in the battle for state legislative majorities. Check out Governing Magazine's state legislative maps here, all showing the current party breakdown and the forecast.

In California, meanwhile, voters are going to weigh in tomorrow on Prop. 27, an initiative that would reverse a 2008 plan that placed redistricting plans for state Assembly and Senate districts in the hands of an independent commission rather than the state legislature. GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has campaigned hard against the measure, making a less partisan approach to redistricting his pet political reform. Then again, Schwarzenegger can afford to take such a stand: He's a lame-duck governor.

(Photo: AP/John Bazemore)