A Long Night's Journey into Day in Minneapolis

The lawn signs are still up for Al Franken here in Minneapolis. And they seem likely to stay up until long after the squirrels have eaten the faces off of all the remaining jack-o-lanterns. A mandatory recount looms in Al's still-undecided Senate contest with Republican incumbent Norm Coleman and the results may not be known for another month. Right now, Coleman's lead is an astonishingly slender 477 votes out of almost 3 million cast. A third party candidate won about 15% of them though from whom is still widely debated.

With matters still adrift in limbo, this seems like a good time to reflect on Al Franken's unique accomplishment in this year of unique accomplishments. First of all, I should say that Al has been my friend for 15 years. I don't know Norm Coleman from a hole in the ground (though I'm told the difference is very slight.) And, though I lived in Minneapolis for a year to produce Al's radio show, I am not an expert on local politics.

But I do know that the outcome is close enough that a contest that was a statistical toss-up on Election Day remains one right now. Al Franken (who CNN's Alex Castellanos dismissed as a "lunatic" on Tuesday night) received the votes of more than 1.2 million of his fellow Minnesotans and raised over $15 million in order to fight what turned out to be the most expensive Senate race in the country. Al is a serious contender, despite the opposition's predictable ruse of taking some of his riskier jokes at face value and then declaring themselves to be shocked and dismayed and demanding apologies, etc., etc. I can't think of another candidate who has had to face "selective humorlessness" as a political dirty trick.

To give them credit, good-natured Minnesotans seem to have understood the mechanics of comedy enough to know that what makes Al Franken good at what he does is the ability to calibrate both the outrage and the outrageousness in his material for proper effect. Scandinavians are usually regarded as pretty gloomy bunch but their support for Al shows that they've got just an acute a sense of humor as anyone.

Al was also branded as "too angry" early in the race, conjuring images of fistfights and shouting matches on the Senate floor that might erode the dignity of the place. Of course, that was before the entire country began to start feeling pretty angry, too.

As it turned out, on the campaign trail, Al was neither especially angry nor terribly funny. If he has a tendency toward the former (which I would deny, by the way), he proved capable of keeping it in check. If he was, at times, understandably indignant over the state of our nation, he showed remarkable self-restraint in the face of a sustained and extremely sordid mud-sling from the other guy. Additionally, anyone who came to his rallies expecting a sort-of Kinky Friedmanesque elaborate prank was also sadly disappointed. To get a sense of Al's style on the campaign trail, think Estes Kefauver not Jesse Ventura.

His friends (and his readers and listeners) know that Al has never been "just a comedian." Despite our American fondness for labels and our suspicion of people who do different things well, Al's always been a policy wonk with a special aptitude for intricate issues like Social Security and health care. He's also always been a softy who "cries at McDonald's commercials," as he puts it. Anyone who saw him speak about the plight of Americans suffering from any of the many ills that can be addressed through public policy, whether it's losing a home to foreclosure or losing a son to a roadside bomb, could not doubt his empathy and sincerity.

It would be a truly tasteless joke to compare the first comedian elected to nationwide office with the election of our first black president. (Even though, I, for one, will not be fully satisfied until we have elected a black comedian to the White House.) No matter what comics may say from time to time, a bad set at the Laugh Factory is not comparable to slavery. But there is a connection between Al's journey and Barack Obama's and Obama spoke about it in his victory speech on Tuesday night when he described his election as a defeat for cynicism.

Al's decision to get off of the sidelines where he could have continued his very comfortable career as a comic and a critic, strikes me as just that. Professional humorists get a lot of credit, especially at election time, but, at the end of the day, we're still mere spectators, at a fundamental moral disadvantage from those we ridicule. Al Franken's decision to walk his talk, to take the hard role of participant when things could be so much easier on the cynical side of the public square, sets an example that should make every wise-ass take a long, hard look in the mirror.

Late Tuesday night at the Crowne Plaza in St. Paul before an ebullient crowd that had just seen Barack Obama elected president, Al Franken spoke to his supporters. As he likes to do, Al quoted the late Paul Wellstone, whose Senate seat he hopes to win back. Wellstone, he said, believed that "the future belongs to those who work hard and are passionate." And, he added, to those who are patient.

Whenever I hear Al recite this line, I can't resist a cynical aside to anyone handy or, if no one is, to myself. My stock joke in reply to his stock quote is that Donald Trump works hard and is passionate. Does the future belong to him? Or how about the tireless Heinrich Himmler (not Goering, who was a notorious lazybones)? But last night, the obligatory jest didn't feel right. At the end of the day, making jokes is a little easy compared with making history.

Comments

[eznelson]

I have discovered what I believe to have been some vote SUBTRACTIONS in the Al Franken and Norm Coleman race. I just posted the story on OpEdNews. Please take a look and let me know what you think. I don't have the same experience at looking at election fraud so maybe there is some normal explanation for this. I can't think of one right now.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Evidence-of-Republican-Fra-by-E-Nelson-081110-788.html

[EmeraldCity]

I've read completely thru these comments, have to add that as a lifelong Dem and progressive there was a time that I thought Al was a very funny, very bright satirist and commentator. that feeling ended when it became clear that al had a much bigger agenda and his show became nothing more than an infomercial for his political career. You also will not win a federal election by condescending to fifty per cent of the population and deriding them as stupid which Al unfortuately has a tendency to do. Somehow Al got it into his mind that it was his destiny to be elected to the Senate and the fact that any generic democrat in MN would have waltzed to a victory (Klobuchar and Obama won by how much?) and Al after millions of dollars and two years of prep could only get 42 per cent of the vote should make it obvious that this was a very selfish, egotistical run on Al's part that will possibly prevent the removal of one of the most odious Republicans in the Senate. Al knew that he was probably the most polarizing, controversial candidate the Dems could possibly field but his ego and ambition wouldn't let him step aside.
By the way, for all of those progressive Dems out there, why would Hillary Clinton be pilloried and lambasted as a political opportunist for her support (when it started) for the war in Iraq and Al Franken get a complete pass?
.

[SamEllison]

Auntie Em you sound like you are the third party candidate?
Al is a good man and a real patriot, did you go on any USO tours?

[kevingiampa]

Al Franken said he was wrong, and demonstrated that he's not likely to support, again, an ill-conceived war or to hand war powers over to an incompetent and belligerent Administration.

[lindalaughsatrepubs]

the count is now only 239 votes difference...there WILL and SHOULD be a recount (and i wish Dean Barkley votes could be given to Al)...this was another snafu election, and i just pray that Al will come out ahead...if not, there is always the chance that Norm will be impeached due to his receiving money (75k)from a supporter - supposedly paid from a corporation to his wife, who DOES NOT work for that corporation...we can only hope...~sigh~...

[bosse]

Hope Al Franken will be the next great Senator from MN like Mc Carthey, Humphrey and Mondale

[kevingiampa]

It would be a bit easier to take Coleman seriously when he says he worries about the cost to Minnesota of the recount, if he wasn't busy wasting money in Minnesota courts pursuing a frivolous lawsuit concerning a campaign ad he didn't like.

[lipstickonapug]

I wonder what will happen with the lawsuit over the $75,000 bonus Laurie Coleman received ? Too bad the news about t he lawsuit came out last Thursday. Probably too late to make a difference plus people have to actually listen to the news. One other problem is the record # of absentee ballots filed and many of them missed the news about Colemans $75.000 and Bachmans anti-american statements. So much for October surprises.

[TheIndependenceParty]

Bachmann and Coleman. You guys in MN are scaring us now. We used to think you had the most sense of all immigrant European Americans.

Don't you listen to "A Prairie Home Companion"? Or don't you believe in it?

[bphoon]

Coleman's been declaring victory and trying to blame Al for the recount, saying Franken should waive the recount and save the taxpayers the money. This is typical Coleman. He forgets, however, that MN law **requires** a recount if the vote difference is less than 0.5%. In this race, the difference is 0.01%. I guarantee Coleman, if he were down by 477, would have his face in some TV camera somewhere nearly all the time lobbying for a recount. Because of the way the optical scanners we use read ballots, the typical incidence of flawed ballots is about 2 in 1000. Someone may have circled a candidate's name, for example, rather than filling in the 'bubble" that the scanner reads. Out of nearly 3 million votes cast, there would then be a possible 6,000 or so ballots that may not have been counted. MN law also provides that if a voter's intent is clear (all recounts are done by hand here), the vote counts whether the balolot was filled in correctly or not. The process takes a while but the under the law the emphasis is on accuracy not speed. That's as it should be and we should just let the process play out and see where the chips fall. I'm putting my Franken lawn sign back out...

[bclintonk]

Like 3 out of 4 voters in my St. Paul precinct, I voted Obama/Franken. Unfortunately, some Obama supporters---about 360,000---didn't vote for Franken. Some first-time voters focused only on the presidential race and didn't vote down-ticket. Some ticket-splitters, after voting Obama, went out of their way to choose Norm Coleman or third-party candidate Dean Barkley. Some Democrats, turned off by nonstop negative advertising in the Senate race, protested by voting for Barkley (who didn't advertise) or skipping the Senate race. Sadly, that leaves Al currently 338 votes behind Coleman.

But it's not over. A recount is automatically triggered if the final result is within 0.5%---the tabulation error rate for the optical scan system we use in Minnesota. If that rate holds for the 2.885 million votes in the Senate race, some 14,400 votes were miscounted by the optical scanners and should be picked up in the hand recount. That doesn't guarantee a Franken win, but with 14,400 votes still out it's still a horse race. And the error rate tends to be higher in lower-income (typically more Democratic) areas where more voters mistakenly circle their choice or mark the oval with an X or check---marks that optical scanners miss but easily satisfy the "clear indication of voter intent" standard for recounts under Minnesota law. It's possible Coleman holds his lead, but more likely Franken closes the gap, possibly enough to overtake Coleman.

Go Al!

[tompoe]

If Coleman prevails, and returns to Washington, he faces some serious questions regarding his role as head of PSI. It will be time to face the music, as the new administration, the new Congress, explores the activities of the Bush years. Can't wait until they get around to discussing Coleman's role in facilitating the fraud and corruption of the Iraq war years.

[redford]

As is the case with others, I watched Al on tv and listened every day to his radio show via internet. My Mom was jealous about me hearing him on the internet because she was one of Al's biggest fans when he had the tv program and once that was concluded, she couldn't get her dose of Al because she didn't have a computer. Mom passed away last April and was truly a political junky. I can only imagine how euphoric she would have been with Obama's win and how nervous Mom would be with Al's re-count. Al, no one has campaigned harder than you and it's appreciated, and I know I don't have to say this, but....please fight the good fight until the end...my Mom and I are behind you all the way! Fans in Indiana

[wowjustwow]

I moved to mpls from NYC. And I'm Jewish. I'm not remotely that funny and I'm not given to voting for people I don't consider brilliant, and Al is one I do.

Honestly, I think there's a lot of anti-semitism here. The code words are "angry" and "New York" and "different."

I realize that Coleman is also Jewish. But he's a more assimiliationist, Midwestern "Oh I didn't know" kind of Jew.

[RedBarberian]

Al was Nadered. The third party candidate took votes away from him. If and when there is a run-off, Al should get into the Senate.

[mtflyer]

I wish to heck Nader would just let it go. He has never and will never have a chance of winning. His contributions to the environment, consumerism, and other causes have been outstanding and he should keep on those instead of diluting them by playing politics. I just hope that he hasn't prevented Minnesota from having a senator they can count on to do what's right!

[broezekiel]

Nader didn't run in Minn. That was just a metaphor.

[reasonlives]

Check your facts before posting. The 3rd party candidate who got 15% had nothing to do with Nader, he is a Jesse Ventura type and not a liberal, polls showed he took votes about equally from Coleman and Franken.
There are no run offs in Minnesota Senate races. You are wrong twice in a very short post.

[kikidog]

Al was born and raised in St. Louis Park, MN. He is a great guy and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for him. As a Minnesotan, I am sick of Norm Coleman - if he wins, he will go to the Senate with an Ethics case pending against him and I hope they boot him out.
I am also embarrased that the 6th district re-elected Michelle Bachmann. Thank goodness I do not live in that district. Minnesotans, stay out of that area(St. Cloud to Stillwater) and do not spend any tourist money in that district - that will get 'em where it hurts!!

[bphoon]

I couldn't agree more about both Al and Bachmann. Michelle Bachmann is a continuous national embarrassment to the state of MN...I can't believe there are people who actually want her representing them in Washington. Just goes to show you how many crackheads there really are in the Eastern/Northern suburbs of the Twin Cities...

[newmango]

I live in California, but I sent money to Al's campaign, and now I feel bad that I should have sent more.

I listened to his show on Air America Radio almost every day it was on. You can't listen to him talk about Paul Wellstone or his frequent trips to Iraq to entertain the troops without hearing a man who deeply and personally cares about this country and how it is being led. I don't think it was an easy or light decision for him to decide to run for the Senate, but I was thrilled when he did. I hope the recount goes in his favor. Anyone who thinks they don't know enough about Al should watch the documentary film "God Spoke."

[bphoon]

Read his books, too...that's where I got turned on to Al Franken, policy wonk.