Fun with GIS 336: Every Four Years
It’s 2024, and the year of a US presidential election. This will be the 17th such election in my memory, starting with 1960. I remember close elections before, but none for which pundits rationally explained how easily the US House, US Senate, and US President could all be controlled by one party, all by another party, or some mix. How is this so? Perhaps a map can help.
Here is a map of the "current state of affairs." (The detailed US 118th Congressional Districts layer may not yet include some recent developments; as of this writing, two special elections are pending.) You can explore data in multiple ways, and this map includes various representations of political power. One map layer includes charts attached to it, so selection in the chart shows in the map.
Looking at the different layers, you can see numbers in different ways. Of course, individual numbers are not the whole story in politics; various other factors (personality, longevity of service, span of current term, assignments, local context, and so on) matter tremendously, and the mix matters hugely (see blog). But one can see "narrow margin" in multiple ways here.
So what? In 1858, Abraham Lincoln (borrowing a biblical idea) noted that "a house divided against itself cannot stand." This year's election features fervent supporters across a political spectrum; this may not be a perfect bell curve. Looking at the map layers and charts may help teachers show how data can be represented in different ways, and help students understand why politics seem particularly fractious and why presenters interested in swaying opinions might use some displays rather than others. Candidates, constituents, supporters, voters, citizens, and residents are not identical sets within vox populi. Teachers, and especially teachers of social studies, have a tremendous opportunity -- I would say duty -- to help students this year cope with torrents of inputs, consider carefully, and make rational decisions.
As John McHale noted (see blog), "the future of the future is in the present."
