Tribe Gored

It's always dangerous to predict Supreme Court behavior after oral argument, but in my opinion David Boies was not terribly persuasive before the Supreme Court today.  In fact, I thought he performed quite poorly.  He was subjected to some pretty severe questioning, and didn't seem to have his usual command (perhaps because he wasn't addressing the Kangaroos).

It made me wonder why in the world AlGore decided to dump Laurence Tribe to go with Boies.  As Micah pointed out recently, Tribe was pedantic in his last trip to the Supreme Court, but Tribe -- a brilliant scholar who knows the Justices inside and out in an academic sense -- also stayed on message with regard to a case that was, frankly, quite weak, and he often anticipated Justice's questions and was able to avoid getting tripped up.  I think he would have served AlGore quite a bit better today -- and this comes from someone who disagrees vehemently with most if not all of Tribe's views on American constitutionalism.

Then again, dumping Tribe is really somewhat in character for AlGore, whose decisions on strategy and personnel have been shaky throughout the election campaign.  How fitting that dumping Tribe may have indeed sealed the deal for him.

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