Day one is done and nothing too exciting came out of it. Sixteen alleged voters testified, presumably about having their vote stolen in the Working Families Party primary in 2009.


Pretty routine stuff and all expected.

What everyone is holding their breath over is which one of the nine implicated Democrats will flip and testify against some or all of the others. The odds on favorite is Kevin McGrath - he, from what we understand, has the most to lose with a felony conviction.

The first day was slow but this is going to be a drawn out thing. Special Prosecutor Trey Smith is taking his time but that's not unexpected either. He has a reputation of being meticulous and a pretty straight shooter too. He is a Democrat, after all, and yet shows no indication he will go easy on members of his own party.

In his request for getting paid $125 an hour - which was reduced to $100 an hour by Columbia County Judge Paul Czajka - he implied he'd rather squeeze guilty pleas out of some or all rather than go to trial or trials. Squeeze is meant with all due affection, by the way, and not meant to imply anything sinister. A guilty plea by any or all of those implicated would save time, money and probably the inevitable outcome anyway.

There was a bunch of chatter around town about why the subpoenas only targeted Election Commissioner Ed McDonough and Councilman Mike LoPorto and one explanation is that Smith didn't need DNA to get indictments against those two. Lending credibility to that theory is Smith's request for payment, in which he states he won't bring DNA evidence until sometime after Jan. 1.

We'll end this post by saying we fully expect some outrage over Smith getting paid $100 an hour but that's really not bad considering the caliber of attorney he is and the job he's done so far.