Tipster Says State’s Plan Will Touch Every District

I don’t know why people who send “tips” by email send them from wierd accounts with wierd subject headings so I think they are spam and delete them.

Anyway, as I was cleaning up my inbox today, I noticed an email that came in at about 1 a.m. this morning. It looked suspiciously like a bunch of spam I’ve been getting lately where the email messages actually have subjects that look legitimate but their bodies are actually images (to fight the spamblockers) that tell you about wonderful “no-risk” stocks in which to invest.

I decided to click on this one to make sure it got added to the crappy filters I’ve got in place and it turned out to be a legitimate email to me from someone calling themselves “The Red Viewer.” The Red Viewer is, in real life, the thing you use to view (and, I guess, design) the redistricting maps.

The Red Viewer claims to be an “insider” (who doesn’t) that knows someone who has intimate, behind-the-scenes knowledge of the plans the state will submit to the three-judge panel later this month to rectify the problems within CD-23 that the U.S. Supreme Court declared unconstitutional.

Normally, I don’t do much with tips from people that haven’t been tipsters before; it’s too hard to prove if they are reliable, truthful, or just crazy assbag, batshit, rightwingers who want to see something they wrote on a blog but are too afraid to blog themselves.

However, Red Viewer’s claims are so damned amusing and outlandish I felt that they were at least worthy of publishing…for amusement. Let me say I seriously doubt the veracity of one of the claims Red Viewer claims. But, if they prove to be true, I guess I’ve found myself a new tipster.

Here’s what The Red Viewer had to say:

the state will actually submit multiple plans to the judges.

at least one of the plans is being deliberately crafted to be so outlandish it will force the judges to look at the lesser impact plans.

i have been told information about two of the plans. it is very general. one plan will alter only districts 23, 28 and 25. the alterations to 25 will be the most dramatic. the other plan i have been told about redraws 23, 18, and 25 in such a way that every single congressional district in the state is impacted. as you should know, this plan will require new elections in every congressional district because all of the boundaries will be altered. Districts farther north and east will see the least amount of alteration. in most districts farthest away from the hot zone, all or parts of a county are shifted from district to district to result in the alteration of every single district. In the urban areas shifts of one or two voting precincts are used to alter those district. The map will not look that much different on paper except for south texas but the impact will be felt in all of the districts.

In addition to evidently thinking he or she is e.e. cummings (the all lowercase letters), the person seems to be focusing on the three districts EVERYBODY is focusing on, so this may be a hoax. Further, if “Red Viewer” knew anything about the maps, why isn’t he/she telling us what the alterations will be to CD-25 that will be so “dramatic?”
However, I was intreagued by the use of the term “hot zone.” Is that what folks in Austin who are doing the mapmaking are calling CD-23? “The Hot Zone?” That’s hilarious if it is true.

Since Red Viewer is no doubt a reader of this blog, how about providing me with a bit more information?

As for speculating on where Red Viewer may be getting his/her info from, I don’t think it is the AG’s office. I monitor site stats pretty closely, and rarely if ever do I get hits from servers that are from the AG’s office. Most state servers are comptroller’s office employees, HHSC, LBB or Legislative Council employees, or from legislative offices. As I understand it, hits from legislators’ staff show up as being “legislative council” hits.

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