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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: PROLIFE who wrote (525576)	1/17/2004 2:48:53 PM
From: steve harris	Respond to of 769667

Looks like time to stop the Canadian rape of America. :)

To: PROLIFE who wrote (525576)	1/17/2004 4:16:48 PM
From: Hope Praytochange	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769667

Supreme Court Hands Texas GOP a Redistricting Victory By Lee Hockstader Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, January 17, 2004; Page A02 AUSTIN, Jan. 16 -- The Supreme Court handed Texas Republicans a resounding political victory Friday -- and potentially as many as seven new seats in the next Congress -- when it refused to block an extraordinary mid-decade redistricting plan bitterly opposed by Democrats. The court may still decide to hear an appeal later this year from congressional Democrats, minority groups and others who contend the map promotes the Republicans' electoral chances by breaking up minority communities and submerging them into overwhelmingly conservative, white districts. However, in declining to hear the Democrats' emergency appeal for now, the justices cleared the way for this year's congressional elections to proceed under the new map, which was drawn up by GOP leaders in Austin and Washington, including House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. The GOP plan targets white Democratic incumbents, who have been a mainstay of the Texas delegation in the House since the 19th century. To that end, the new map eliminates or radically reconfigures the districts of white Democratic incumbents, leaving the party's safe seats in the state almost exclusively in the hands of African Americans and Hispanics. The state's 32-member congressional delegation, now evenly split between the parties, could be reshaped into a 22-10 or 23-9 Republican majority as a result of the new map, independent analysts say. That would give Texas, the nation's second most-populous state, the largest Republican voting bloc in Congress. The court's action Friday, made without comment, followed a decision by a special federal court panel in Austin last week that upheld the Republican plan. The three-judge panel said it was deciding only the legality of the plan, "not its wisdom." In December, the Justice Department also signed off on the GOP map. As do most states, Texas has a long tradition of congressional redistricting plans foisted on the minority party by the majority. For decades, that meant the Democrats who controlled both houses of the state legislature would redraw the congressional district map to their liking after each decennial census, while generally taking care to leave Republican incumbents alone. But in 2003, for the first time since Reconstruction, Republicans controlled both houses of the Texas legislature. And even though federal judges had imposed a new district map on the state just two years earlier, the newly empowered Republicans forced through their own fresh map despite the protests of Democratic lawmakers, who staged quorum-busting walkouts to Oklahoma and New Mexico.