The public understands the current partisan process protects many incumbents of both political parties, limits competition on election ballots, and costs taxpayers millions of dollars in legal bills.

Chief Justice John Roberts, in refusing to stop gerrymandering by Democrats in Maryland and by Republicans in North Carolina last week, said “excessive partisanship in districting” is “incompatible with democratic principles.” Yet in writing for a 5-4 majority, he contended the U.S. Supreme Court has no authority or legal standards to limit it.

That was disappointing. If gerrymandering is “unjust,” as Roberts suggested, then a justice of the highest court would seem an appropriate person to address the harm to democracy, as prohibited by the Constitution.

Center Stage: Tony Evers gets his revenge Critics including many of his fellow Democrats claimed Tony Evers was too boring to be elected Wisconsin's governor. They were wrong. And at the recent Wisconsin Democratic Convention, he got his revenge: "Who's boring now?" he crowed, touting his veto pen as a powerful check on the Republican-run Legislature. On this week's "Center Stage" political podcast, Milfred and Hands play clips and comment on his recent convention speech, which reminds Milfred of the ending to "Revenge of the Nerds."

Nonetheless, a court decision was never going to force the Wisconsin Legislature to abide by a neutral system the way the Iowa model would. The ultimate solution is AB 303, approved with bipartisan support. The Iowa model turns over the task of redrawing voting districts following each major census to a nonpartisan state agency insulated from politics. The agency must draw districts that reflect changes in population and are as contiguous as possible while following the boundaries of communities. The agency is forbidden from considering the impact of the lines on politics.