Thoughtful Americans agree that the endless begging for funds and votes by congressmen is a blight to democracy. Oh, and so is congressional gerrymandering. Americans agree about that, too.
That’s why May brought e-mail from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee headlined “Vulnerable One-Term Wonder Bob Dold Reneges on Promise of Certainty for Illinois Businesses.” It’s why last Friday I opened an e-mail from “Brad Schneider for Congress” that denounced an antiabortion bill that had just passed the House and asked me to sign a petition and “join Brad and Democrats across the country and take a stand for women’s rights!”
“The corrupt process of gerrymandering has led to a deeply partisan and ineffective Congress,” Dold said when the bills were introduced in March. He noted that a recent survey had rated only 20 percent of the 435 House districts as competitive.
