Vulgar Mockery Of Christians: Is This What We Want In A U.S. Senator?

I get it -- Al Franken is a serious senatorial candidate despite his penchant for the pornographic. Franken's one-liners about rape and oral sex and his leering fantasies about big-busted women were just for yucks, right?

Last June, DFL bigwigs chose to forget about their man's decades-long record of sexual crudity after he hooked the endorsement by putting on a serious face and saying "sorry" at the party's convention.

But Franken didn't apologize for another aspect of his trash-talking shtick. He's aimed some of his most offensive material at religious believers, particularly Christians.

Why hasn't this been aired in public? We in the press are too busy searching through Sarah Palin's junior high yearbooks and tracking down the filing dates of Joe the Plumber's tax returns.

Meanwhile, Franken gets a pass for making a joke of the life and death of Jesus Christ.

Franken finds Christ's crucifixion to be a barrel of laughs. For example, in his 1999 book, "Why Not Me?" he wrote about his discovery -- as a fictional former president -- of "the complete skeleton of Jesus Christ still nailed to the cross" during an archeological dig. At the Franken Presidential Library gift shop, visitors can buy "small pieces of Jesus' skeleton."

"We would like to display Jesus' skeleton at some future point," Franken went on. "It's merely a matter of designing and building an exhibition space ... . Until then he's very comfortable in a box down in our basement near the geothermal power station."

Very funny. Anybody want to try a joke like that about Mohammed?

Franken also wrote a Saturday Night Live monologue for Jesus Christ that appeared in a magazine. After poking fun at Christians' belief that Jesus was both God and man, he had Christ speculate on having the hots for Mary Magdalene:

"If Mary Magdalene looked like Barbara Hershey, I might have thought twice about this celibacy thing. I mean, the real Mary Magdalene was about four foot two, 135 pounds. And with bad teeth yet."

In Franken's world, God has a mouth as foul as Franken's. In one book, he has God refer to books about liberal media bias as "total bullshit." Later, he describes God as having his head "up his ass."

But Franken saves his sharpest barbs for those weirdos, Catholics.

In 2006, he and a guest on his Air America radio show joked about Eucharistic communion wafers -- sacred to Catholics as the body of Christ -- and compared them to chips and guacamole. In "Dog Confessional," a proposed sketch for Saturday Night Live, Franken depicted "a series of dogs, played by cast members, confessing to a priest," according to the Washington Post. NBC refused to air it.

In another book, Franken described greeting a New York audience with the words, "Isn't Cardinal O'Connor an asshole?"

Franken's campaign did not return a phone call seeking comment.

If a 12-year-old kid spouted this stuff in a schoolyard, he'd be hauled to the principal's office and told to grow up. But in today's surreal political climate, a guy who lobs insults like these has a shot at one the highest political offices in the land.

We're used to slanderers of Christianity getting government arts grants. But Franken wants more. He's asking us to send him to what's been called "the most exclusive club in the world" -- and to serve us there until 2014.

Our nation's founders wanted the Senate -- as Congress' upper house -- to balance with a sober, long-term perspective the much more numerous House of Representatives, whose members serve only two-year terms and are supposed to reflect the people's shifting sentiments. Senators serve six-year terms, and were intended to be the nation's wisest councilors -- equipped to discern and protect the country's broad, enduring interests.

"The use of the Senate," explained James Madison in 1787, "is to consist in proceeding with more coolness, with more system, and with more wisdom, than the popular branch."

For this reason, the Constitution entrusts the Senate with unique powers -- its members conduct impeachment trials, make treaties, and give the president advice and consent on important appointments, including Cabinet secretaries, ambassadors and federal judicial nominees with lifetime tenure.

A Minnesota senator represents the whole state, not a smaller, relatively homogeneous congressional district, as House members do.

If Franken is elected, can he represent all the people of Minnesota -- including Christians -- for whom he has repeatedly shown disdain?

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Election 2008: Who People In Minnesota Should Vote For

The Left is frothing over this race, but the passion seems displaced. Coleman, a centrist uncomfortable in a right-wing party, is exactly the kind of Republican Democrats can work with; Franken, the sort of knee-jerk partisan that both parties should avoid like disease. Anyway, we preferred his earlier, funny work.

Esquire endorses: Coleman

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Franken Is Target Of Tough Ads - From DFLer

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken has someone taking serious shots at him on network and cable TV and the Web -- and it's not Republican Sen. Norm Coleman.

DFLer Priscilla Lord Faris, a last-minute, little-known primary challenger, has come out with a biting ad that aims at Franken's softest spots -- his sometimes dicey humor and past business tax troubles -- in a harder fashion than has his GOP opponent.

In the low-budget ad, which features only her, Lord Faris tells viewers that while she once thought Franken could defeat Coleman, "his record of pornography and degradation of women and minorities and questionable financial transactions will be the source of blistering ads for the Republican attack machine."

Lord Faris is referring to a piece that Franken wrote for Playboy in 2000 and bits of humor regarding women and minorities that he's told or written over the years.

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Democrat Attacks Franken For 'Pornography'

Comedian Al Franken has been facing a barrage of attack ads from Republican Sen. Norm Coleman over past, lewd writings and failure to pay back taxes.

But now he's taking a serious hit from a Democratic challenger, who is just up with an ad that's harsher than Coleman's toughest attacks.

Attorney Priscilla Lord Faris, a last-minute entrant into the Democratic primary, argues that Franken is unelectable in her new advertisement.

"Early on, I believed Al Franken could defeat Norm Coleman. Now, two years and millions of dollars later, it's clear his record of pornography, degradation of women and minorities and questionable financial transactions will be the source of blistering ads from the Republican attack machine," Lord Faris says in the ad.

Franken has been struggling to move beyond talk of his personal past, airing two advertisements directly addressing the controversies. This latest attack from Faris won't help matters any.

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Franken Stumbling In Minnesota Senate Race

Just a few months ago, Al Franken had plenty of reasons to smile about his chances of unseating Minnesota's Republican Sen. Norm Coleman.

Minnesotans oppose the war -- and the president -- that Coleman supported. Franken was doing his homework: he had entered the race early and was running a strong grass-roots campaign focused on local organizing and smaller-venue events.

And, in early June, he secured the DFL nomination at the state convention on the first ballot.

But costly mistakes in the campaign of former Saturday Night Live writer are now imperiling his chances of winning.

Poll trends in the past several weeks indicate that Coleman has increased his lead over Franken. Although the numbers have fluctuated, four of the last five polls show Coleman ahead of Franken -- three by more than nine points. So now, CQ Politics is changing the rating on the race to Leans Republican from No Clear Favorite.

Lawrence Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, says that Franken now finds himself tied with Coleman among women voters, union members and Twin Cities residents. "Clearly there's been some damage. What the polls are showing is that the kind of coalition a Democrat needs to win just is not forming."

Franken has "really been unable to get on track where he's got a consistent message with regards to what he stands for that's credible, and a line of attack on the incumbent," Jacobs said. "Again and again in this race Franken's on the defensive."

Franken has struggled with issues related to his late payment of taxes in 17 states that dated back to 2003-2006 as well as some of his more controversial work during his career as a satirist, including a piece titled "Porn-O-Rama" that was published in Playboy in 2000. These problems have created an odd situation "where the challenger is the one who's being challenged," Jacobs said.

The issues over taxes and Franken's writings "have really stuck with voters, I think," said Steven Schier, a political scientist at Carleton College. And now, Franken has drawn a primary challenge from Priscilla Lord Faris, the daughter of well-known Minnesota Democrat Miles Lord, a retired federal judge.

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Franken Fallout Continues

The backlash from key Democratic leaders against comedian Al Franken's Senate campaign is not subsiding, with the latest criticism coming from the abortion-rights group Planned Parenthood, a normally reliable supporter of Democratic candidates.

According to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Planned Parenthood's senior legislative director Connie Perpich sent an e-mail to state Democratic legislators raising concerns about a 10-year-old explicit article he wrote for Playboy magazine in 2000.

"We certainly support First Amendment rights of all Americans, but do believe these comments have gone beyond the bounds of what is appropriate for any candidate for elected office," Perpich wrote. "If half of these allegations are true, it is very difficult for us to foresee the Planned Parenthood of Minnesota Action Fund Board endorsing the candidacy of anyone with such extreme perspectives."

The article has already drawn sharp criticism from Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), who said that she is not planning on endorsing Franken in the general election.

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Franken's Porn-O-Rama Is No Satire

In the last few months, I've gotten a flood of emails from readers suggesting stories about Al Franken and his follies. This vein could be a rich one to mine, given Franken's years of motor-mouthing on Saturday Night Live and Air America Radio, and his collisions with taxing authorities across the country.

But I've let the Franken stories blow by, overwhelmed by their number. However, things changed last week when Franken's 2000 Playboy article -- "Porn-O-Rama" -- got stuck in my e-mail filter.

I know what you're thinking: Kersten's got one of those prudish, Jerry Falwell-style family filters designed to snare anything that would raise a slight pink on your grandmother's cheeks. Not so. Mine seems to screen primarily ads for male enhancement products and overly creative animal films.

Why then did my e-mail filter crash closed on Porn-O-Rama?

In his Playboy romp, Franken fantasized about oral sex delivered by a machine, as well as sex with combinations of females who fit the Playboy view of women as big-breasted automatons, panting at the prospect of servicing the likes of Franken. That's why they call it fantasy, I guess.

I wonder how many DFL officials will be able to pull Porn-O-Rama through their Internet filters and read it before the party endorses its candidate for U.S. Senate this weekend. I wonder, too, whether folks like Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Attorney General Lori Swanson, whose campaigns took money in 2006 from Franken's so-called Midwest Values PAC (yes, you read that right) will feel compelled to return those bucks on truth-in-advertising grounds.

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Franken's Porn Story Has Party In A Lather

A week before Minnesota DFLers endorse a U.S. Senate candidate, behind-the-scenes rumblings about a satirical Playboy magazine article written by candidate Al Franken eight years ago have broken into the open.

Among those weighing in are Democrat Jim Oberstar, dean of the Minnesota delegation in the U.S. House, and New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

On Thursday, Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minn., called the sexually explicit article offensive and potentially damaging to Franken and other Democratic candidates in Minnesota.

The Franken campaign and backers of the candidate said the work was merely satire and faulted McCollum for dividing the party.

"As a woman, a mother, a former teacher, and an elected official, I find this material completely unacceptable," McCollum said of Franken's piece, published in 2000 under the headline "Porn-O-Rama!"

"I can tell you it's not playing comfortably in St. Paul, and I can't imagine this politically radioactive material is doing very well in suburban and rural districts," McCollum said.

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