Tuesday, June 02, 2009

It's So Over

I was able to watch the majority of the Supreme court hearing yesterday. The MN Supremes had no problem slapping around the Coleman . Eric Black shares:
1. The questions to Coleman attorney Joe Friedberg were significantly more skeptical and more aggressive and covered a wider range of problems with that side of the case. Anyone who had to guess which way the court will rule based on this morning's exchanges would probably say that it looks bad for Coleman.
I would say it looks terminal for Coleman. Even the staunchest Republican on the bench seemed skeptical of Coleman;s arguments:
Dietzen, who also asked questions of both sides, seemed very troubled by technical problems in Coleman's case that could easily be used to reject the appeal without reaching the big constitutional arguments. I'll give a few details on that below. And I repeat my caution above about inferring a judge's lean from the questions he asks. But no one who was watching this morning could help but notice Dietzen's implications about shortcoming's in Coleman's evidence. If Dietzen -- whose pre-judicial career has the strongest Republican flavor -- isn't voting and arguing for Coleman, the former Senator's goose is cooked.
Dietzens seemed kind of ticked off at the lack of adequate attention to detail:
Dietzen seemed skeptical that Coleman had done enough to even try to meet the burden of proof. Dietzen was very critical of the document, called an offer of proof, that Team Coleman submitted in an effort to show that disparities cost Coleman the election:"I’ve never seen an offer of proof like this," he said. It doesn’t say who the witnesses will be. Why is this not inadequate? he asked. We don’t have admissible evidence to show whether you’ve met your burden.
I think this ruling will come down sooner rather than later. Conventional wisdom, with Tuesday being the normal day for the issuance of decisions, is that this Friday well get some kind of signal from the court, Tuesday it will be come official, and within 24 hours of that, Governor Pawlenty will reluctantly sign the Election Certificate..

Can you believe this may almost be over.

Be sure to ready Eric Black's complete take

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