FORGET THE SPEECHES, rallies, town hall meetings, and whatever other mischief the recall candidates have planned for today. There’s only one place to be and that’s in San Francisco, at the corner of 7th and Mission Streets, where the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals will hear arguments over whether to postpone the October 7 election. If you’re near a television this afternoon, C-SPAN and the cable new networks will broadcast the proceedings live, beginning at 1:00 p.m. (West Coast time). Predicting the 9th Circuit’s next move rivaled the Emmys as California’s favorite guessing game this past weekend. Basically, it comes down to two schools of thought: (1) The 9th Circuit is just arrogant enough to uphold last week’s decision by a three-judge panel to put off recall until March 2; or (2) The court sees the damage of postponing the vote for five months, and will return the special election to its originally scheduled date of two weeks from tomorrow.

The good news: California shouldn’t be kept in suspense for too long. Today’s hearing is scheduled to last only an hour–30 minutes for each side–unless the court drags out the discussion. Presumably, the justices will render an opinion as soon as Wednesday, the same day as the big debate in Sacramento. What happens after that is cause for further speculation. The safe assumption is the losing party will take its appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. It’s not so clear what happens then: if recall is back on, the high court might take a pass; or, it might see the need to jump into the fray and render an opinion so as to keep other courts from disrupting future elections.