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Tanuki: Finally the Democrats are fighting back with their own gerrymanders! Fox: Ha, yeah. Remember what happened when the Dems tried to gerrymander New York State back in 2022? Tanuki: All we need is for California, Maryland, Illinois, and New York... Fox: Dem-appointed judges struck down their own party's maps. Tanuki: ...to bypass democracy to save democracy. Fox: Enjoy this fleeting feeling of hope. Reminds you of August 2024, don't it?

NEW COMIC TWO OR THREE TIMES A WEEK, OR WHEN THE MOOD STRIKES

Note that when Republicans want to gerrymander red states, they just do it, while Democrats keep needing to gather enough votes to overturn anti-gerrymandering laws (which oddly enough don't exist in red states) or bypass independent commissions (funny, also not a thing in red states). Forget bringing a knife to a gunfight, Dems are sitting at ground zero with a pigeon and a can of olives. Democrats are sort of saber-rattling, or at least Gavin Newsom is, but what happened in New York in 2022 is instructive: While the Supreme Court of the United States has no problem whatsoever with just making shit up to give Republicans judicial wins (see Rucho v Common Cause where the Court literally gave up its own power to decide), Democrat-appointed judges in New York actually followed the law like they were supposed to and screwed their own party. Hard. In the end the maps ended up pitting long-time incumbent Democrats against each other, weakening the party in advance of the next election cycle, during which New York's Democratic caucus disintegrated. The Republicans could not have done better. All the GOP needs to do this time around is hang back and watch the Dems step on every rake.

Far be it from me to proclaim the correct strategy here, aside from "go back in time to when Dems controlled Congress and PASS SOME GODDAMN ANTI-GERRYMANDERING LEGISLATION -- although that would hardly work without also reforming the Supreme Court and possibly jailing the January 6th-adjacent -- but I guess it's nice to see some Democrats actually trying to do something. As we swirl down the drain.