Doug asks:
> Clearly some body had to make some kind of final decision,
> politically speaking, and given the prestige and power of the
> SC, why not them? After all, they're the ones who decide whether
> abortion is legal, whether segregation is acceptable, whether
> cops can stop us in the street and search us. So why not this?
-Straight line: because electing the President is left up to the states?
Actually, the final decision in case of a disputed election is clearly given to the House of Representatives. While messy and skewed as far as equal representation given the rules, it has the clear advantage of having the decision on President made by people who were themselves elected to office. That provision is essentially the conversion of our Presidential elections into a parlimentary vote - a far more legitimate result than the Supreme Court making the final decision.
The odd thing is that the Bush folks could have maneuvered for that result in the end, but the Right was so afraid of taking a chance on losing that they loaded the dice - and thereby completely delegitimated themselves.
More power to them :)
-- Nathan