Plausible. Romney is getting demolished in the minority vote. Thankfully that won't affect the House too much because the minority vote is quarantined.
That means that the minority vote is gerrymandered so that it is concentrated in a few sure=thing districts (that will go 75% or so for the Democrat) so that far more districts can go 57-43 for the Republican.
Yes, it does. See North Carolina, South Carolina, to name 2, which are drawn to enact 4 Democratic districts, and 16 Republican ones at 57-43 or so.
Actually, in South Carolina, without a majority-minority 6th district, then instead of 5 safe GOP, 1 lean GOP, and 1 ubersafe Dem district, we'd have 2 or 3 safe GOP districts with the rest being lean GOP. Absent VRA, we'd have gone 6-0 GOP in 2010 and be likely to go 7-0 GOP this year. However, with more competitive seats, it's probable that the GOP would be forced to moderate a bit. Of course if you'd rather have a more ideologically driven GOP, then this leaving of obtainable seats to the Dems may be just what you want.
Agreed. If anything we need to reform the VRA to require non-partisan drawn compact districts.