A House that’s stuck in the 1950s
The House of Representatives doesn’t represent America as it really is today.
Timothy Egan
NYTimes.com
The House of Representatives doesn’t represent America as it really is today, said Timothy Egan. The Republican-controlled House governs a “fantasy nation created in talk-radio land,” where black and gay people don’t exist, women remain subservient, and all gun-safety legislation is a step toward tyranny. Thanks to strategic redrawing of districts, Republicans managed to maintain a 33-seat advantage in the House in the 2012 elections, despite collectively getting 1.4 million fewer votes than Democrats. As America becomes more diverse, House Republicans barricade themselves in homogenous red-state districts where extremism is no vice. Of 41 blacks in the House, zero are Republicans. Of 34 Latinos, just seven are Republicans. Of seven openly gay and bisexual members, none are from the GOP. Just 8 percent of Republican members are women. This retrograde GOP boys’ club is “comically out of step,’’ emphatically opposing commonsense legislation supported by a large majority of Americans, from universal background checks for gun sales to immigration reform. In their parallel universe, democracy is dangerous, and obstruction is the only goal.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
Viewpoint: Michael S. Teitelbaum and Jay M. Winter
feature From The New York Times: “Nearly half of all people now live in countries where women, on average, give birth to fewer than 2.1 babies...
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Snowden’s silence on Putin
feature If Edward Snowden truly is a moral paragon, then he should announce that he can no longer stomach Vladimir Putin’s oppressive behavior.
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
The irrelevance of the United Nations
feature Once again, the United Nations has been “rendered impotent by a small group of thugs.”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Millions of closeted gay men
feature “What percent of American men are gay?”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
The smug confidence of libertarians
feature Why are most libertarians white dudes?
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Seeing racism for what it is
feature Riley Cooper’s case shows just how poorly he and most other Americans understand “what a racist is.”
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Searching for a libertarian paradise
feature Not one of the world’s 193 sovereign states—not even a tiny one—has adopted a full-on libertarian system.
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Viewpoint: Juliette Kayyem
feature From The Boston Globe: “It is now clear that the Tsarnaev brothers had no strategic plan but to kill in a very public fashion....
By The Week Staff Last updated