BY MARK SHERMAN
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court is doing its best to stay out of the spotlight in the final days of the presidential campaign and while the other two branches of government struggle to deal with turmoil in the financial markets.

The term that opened Monday includes no cases on abortion, race or other social issues that might split the court and nation.

The most entertaining case of the term - involving celebrities' use of profanity on live television - will be argued on Election Day, Nov. 4., when attention arguably will be focused elsewhere.

"It's a little light on blockbuster cases," said former Attorney General Richard Thornburgh. "But one never knows ... when those will crop up."

Among the biggest cases so far:

• Efforts by drug makers and tobacco companies to limit consumer lawsuits under state law.

• A battle between the Navy and environmentalists over the use of sonar in training, potentially harming marine mammals.

• A suit against former Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller by a Pakistani man who claims he was badly treated following Sept. 11.

• Whether federal anti-discrimination laws cover people who allege they faced retaliation after cooperating with their employer's internal investigation in the case of a Nashville, Tenn., woman.

• A third try at resolving a punitive-damages award to a smoker's widow.

The court also will decide an array of criminal cases. Several explore the limits of police power to search and arrest people without warrants.

"There are several cases that could end up having great significance in litigation - how are civil-rights cases actually litigated, how are lab reports presented in criminal trials," said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the new University of California, Irvine's law school. "These cases could make a huge difference, but they are not of the magnitude of the Guantanamo cases or Heller," last term's landmark gun-rights case.

The court has been receptive in recent years to arguments that federal law pre-empts state regulation in a number of areas.

There is intense interest among business groups, state governments and consumer advocates in the cases involving suits over false advertising of cigarettes and the liability of the manufacturer of a drug that was improperly injected in a patient, with disastrous results.

By June, Supreme Court terms often look very different than they do at their start.

Perhaps the biggest news that could emerge from the court would be the announcement of a retirement.

Randy Barnett, a Georgetown University constitutional law professor, said the outcome of the election probably will play a big role in retirements, with Hon. John Paul Stevens, 88, and Hon. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 75, considered the most likely to step down soonest.

If McCain wins, Barnett said, "the liberals will stick it out as long as their health reasonably permits."