Following up on my previous post, this WAS a presidential cycle and Obama won the popular vote and Democrats did surprisingly well in Senate races. So why didn't the Dems also take back the House? TPM says the answer is gerrymandering.

In that article the problem sounds at least partially like a preparedness issue (an anonymous Dem operative says they'll be better prepared in 2014, which raises the question "How did you not anticipate this after 2010?"). Also the fact that so many representatives run unopposed (i'm having trouble finding exact numbers on this but i know it includes John Boehner ); that's just pure negligence. I don't care if you don't have money to spend on a long-shot race - you've got to be able to find someone just to be on the ballot.

But it's more than just a strategy/counter-strategy problem. Having a statewide election and then assigning representatives proportionally makes a lot more sense. Or heck, let's just have a national parliamentary system like every other advanced democracy. I know why we are where we are; it's related to our country's history. But our system was designed to evolved and we're not doing it.

There's also this fact mentioned in the comments of the TPM article: "It's been 100 years since we took the House to 435 members. The population has almost tripled since then as well as giving women the vote".