West Virginia Blue
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Since the West Virginia legislature screwed up the print in their redistricting plans and are re-doing it, they should scratch the simple one-county move that made no sense either a nonpartisan or partisan stand point and draw Congressional boundaries that fixes the geographic mess that is WV-02. The plan originally put forward by Sen. John Unger makes the most sense from any standpoint.
WV-02 is one of the most ridiculously drawn districts in the nation. It's a fair criticism to point out that Republican Rep. Shelley Moore Capito very rarely pays attention to the Eastern Panhandle and has little understanding of the place, but in her defense it's so far away - five to six hours of driving - from her home base in West Virginia.
But what the redistricting mess has shown is that redistricting can't be left to the politicians who by nature focus on winning re-election and how redistricting will effect them rather than how it effects people in the districts carved up by them.
Ideally the redistricting fiasco has shown that redistricting can't be left in the hands of the politicians but rather a law should be passed to change the process so a citizen's committee is set up to draw the boundaries. It is too late to set up such a process this time, but there is plenty of time for the legislators to address the issue before the 2020 census.
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