{"id":23937,"date":"2011-10-24T05:00:37","date_gmt":"2011-10-24T10:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=23937"},"modified":"2011-11-01T07:44:47","modified_gmt":"2011-11-01T12:44:47","slug":"the-potemkin-commission-part-ii-transparency-is-for-peasants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=23937","title":{"rendered":"The Potemkin Commission, Part II: Transparency Is For Peasants"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few weeks ago, I noted that “Draw The Line Minnesota<\/a>” – a liberal astroturf group floated by fellow liberal astroturf groups Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, Take Action Minnesota and the Minnesota Council of Non-Profits, but which nonetheless protests that it is “non-partisan”- had convened a “Citizens Commission” to take public testimony on redistricting.<\/p>\n

Kent Kaiser, one of the members of that commission, is speaking up. \u00a0In a letter sent to the judicial Special Redistricing Panel, Kaiser notes the Potemkin nature of the “citizens commission” and, much more importantly, hammers the lack of “transparency” in a process run by a bunch of groups who support “transparency for ye, but not for we”.<\/p>\n

The full letter is displayed below the jump. \u00a0I’m going to pull some money quotes, and add a bit of emphasis.<\/p>\n

Kaiser cuts to the chase fast. \u00a0Many\u00a0critics of the “Draw The Line” process have noted that it served, essentially, as the DFL’s map-drawing process (which, by the way, the DFL never actually did; the DFL caucus submitted no map proposal, despite having a fully-budgeted redistricting office).<\/p>\n

Kaiser points out that that seems to be the case:<\/p>\n

\u00a0Based on my experiences with Draw the Line over the past several months, I urge the Panel to reject the map submitted to the Panel by Draw the Line because the map drawing process was secretive<\/strong> and flawed and ultimately resulted in a partisan map<\/strong> that fails to reflect the objective demographic shifts that have occurred in Minnesota over the past decade. I think that because of its high number of incumbent legislator pairings and because it pairs only Republican members of Congress<\/strong>, the map is too likely to benefit the Democratic Party.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And “Draw The Line’s palaver about “transparency?”:<\/p>\n

I am especially concerned that we commission members were not allowed sufficient time or access to the map to critique it objectively or to determine its implications before we were led to approve it..<\/p>\n

…While I believe our commission did good work in agreeing on a set of principles for redistricting and in trying to get the public involved in the process, I am concerned that the process used in producing a map was ultimately no better than the State Legislature\u2019s process<\/strong>. I know that I am not the only commission member to think this way.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Bear in mind that Kaiser wasn’t condemning the Legislature’s process; on “The Late Debate” a few weeks ago, he noted that the Legislture’s map adhered to the letter and spirit of the body of law that’s grown up around redistricting in the past forty-odd years in Minnesota.<\/p>\n

Not to speak for Kaiser – he does that just fine himself – but I think the point is that for all “Draw The Line”‘s rhetoric, they are really just another partisan effort – and, in this case, one that actually yielded nakedly partisan results:<\/p>\n

In a documented email sent to all commission members and staff, another commission member (of unknown political affiliation) voiced concern over the commission\u2019s process, when he was stifled from discussing map alternatives in the last of our meetings. I quote directly from the email here:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The quote is in the full email; it notes that the “Draw The Line” map was, in short, pretty blatantly gerrymandered and, more importantly, was completely at odds with what “Draw The Line” claimed was the “Citizen’s Commission”‘s purported mission; they delivered one map:<\/p>\n

‘ With one map, the committee had only one choice. That, of course, is not a\u00a0<\/span>choice. And the false claim that it was a committee drawn or even a\u00a0committee guided map, I could not in good conscious endorse\u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I’ve been calling it “the Potemkin Commission”. \u00a0That may have been unfair – but it’s pretty clear that the map is a Potemkin Map, delivered under false, trumped-up pretenses.<\/p>\n

Despite the committee’s purported dedication to be open and transparent, the \u00a0most important part of the map drawing process\u2014the map drawing itself\u2014was\u00a0notably not open and not transparent, even to the committee members. It was<\/p>\n

done in private, \u201cbehind closed doors\u201d as Draw the Line’s website puts it,\u00a0by one or two persons with occasional contributions by some committee\u00a0members. This is no improvement over the legislature.<\/p>\n

The result speaks for itself. The committee’s website says the system is\u00a0broken. The map the committee ultimately endorsed is substantially similar\u00a0to the map that the broken process produced ten years ago. That is a severe\u00a0indictment against the committee’s work in the committee’s own terms.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

All of “Draw The Line”‘s talk of “transparency” and “openness” is so much baked wind.<\/p>\n

Kaiser continues:<\/p>\n

Maps are captivating. They are impressive and persuasive just by virtue of their pictorial nature. Yet our commission has said time and time again, and especially after analyzing our map\u2019s high number of \u201cpairings\u201d of legislators, that our principles could fit many maps, and I hope the Panel will not be persuaded that our commission\u2019s map is the best at applying our own principles, especially inasmuch as it was rushed through production and exposed to little critique or tweaking.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And – let us not forget – painstakingly hidden from public view until the last possible moment<\/a>, which was last Friday, the deadline for submission to the courts.<\/p>\n

More tomorrow.<\/p>\n

Gary Gross also writes about Kaiser’s letter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here’s Kaiser’s letter:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Minnesota Special Redistricting Panel<\/a> <\/object><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few weeks ago, I noted that “Draw The Line Minnesota” – a liberal astroturf group floated by fellow liberal astroturf groups Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, Take Action Minnesota and the Minnesota Council of Non-Profits, but which nonetheless protests that it is “non-partisan”- had convened a “Citizens Commission” to take public testimony […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[119,2],"tags":[143,169,167],"class_list":["post-23937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election-integrity","category-minnesota-politics","tag-common-cause","tag-draw-the-line-mn","tag-redistricting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23937"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23944,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23937\/revisions\/23944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}