Is the source of polarization simple demographics — in particular, the effects of where Democrats and Republicans live and how that affects congressional representation?
That’s the case that Nate Silver makes in an important post today about House districts, in which he demonstrates two things: There are far, far, fewer swing House districts now than 20 years ago, and that with the decline of split-ticket voting fewer House districts vote for the candidate from the minority party in that district. Moreover, he shows, as others have, that the effects of gerrymandering are relatively minor in producing now-common lopsided districts.
Silver doesn’t mention it, but the same thing is true at the state level, with fewer competitive states now than there had been. That’s important, because we see polarization in both the House and the Senate, so any explanation for partisanship in Congress shouldn’t rely very much only on House districting.
This makes a lot of sense, even from a historical perspective. If you consider that senators are elected in statewide races, it goes a long way toward explaining why the Senate has historically been a less partisan chamber than the House — most states, when you get right down to it, are purple states. In all but the reddest of red states or the bluest of blue states, there’s no sense in being an unrelenting partisan, since it won’t get you reelected.
But I am surprised to learn that gerrymandering has very little to do with this. It seems the most obvious culprit. I guess I have to go with media. A lot of districts have no liberal media whatsoever, so all people hear is the crazy-assed bullshit that doesn’t reflect reality at all.
Just an educated guess, but it’s the best explanation I can come up with.
