I'm glad to see that the Democrats have done well. No rubber stamp Congress for the remainder of GWB's term.

A year or two ago, it was difficult to imagine that the Democrats to pick up this many seats. Even with the tumultuous political climate, it is still mildly surprising, but what's worse is that we think this is so. About 30 of the House seats are switching over to Democratic control with around 20 of those seats previously occupied by Republican incumbents. From what I can tell, this only represents 5% of all House members running for reelection.

The incumbent advantage has long been a concern and is often blamed on sitting candidates' ability to raise more money than potential challengers. I would claim that the bigger culprit is the gerrymandering of districts.

Check out our home town. I could move in any direction within a five mile radius of downtown Rochester and have my choice of four different US congressional districts. Also check out the arm of the 22nd district, reaching up to protect Ithaca from being swallowed by the 24th. These aren't the worst examples of gerrymandering, of course, but it's still pretty annoying.

My district, the 28th, is the most ridiculous one, locally. Louise Slaughter represents both the cities of Buffalo and Rochester proper, along with a sliver of Lake Ontario frontage connecting the two. This is a solidly Democratic district (Slaughter won something like 76% of the vote), while the other three local districts were much tighter and, contrary to the nationwide trend, these districts retained their Republican incumbents.

So, what's the big deal, you say? Well, ideally our representative would have our local interests at heart. Greater Rochester has four different House representatives. How are we to have a coherent community voice in Washington?

If all politics is local, we certainly have more than our fair share...