The O'Fuckit Factor

OK, my first ever venting post....after only 1 day of posting! A sign of things to come? Let's hope not...

Aright,I got in a heated convo with someone who will remain nameless (but who I love and hold in the highest respect) about the possibility of Al Franken running for the Senate seat currently occupied by Norm Coleman (R-MN). Let me say that I've listened to some of Franken's book and I applaud his commitment to his issues and his willingness to be a thorn in the sides of those with whom he disagrees. He's an important balancing voice in a world that was slowly becoming dominated by Rightwing slam-artists like Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Anne Coulter and Rush Limbaugh (Rush has been around for a while, and really past his heyday,but he deserves to be mentioned) that terminology makes it sound like I'm unfairly biased against those with a rightwing point of view, I'm not. I have aproblem with those people in particular because they bulldog any guest with whom they disagree. If I had my way in the world, shows like O'Reilly Factor would have a code of conduct much like a High School debate with time limits and rules of order. Sadly, that's not the case. It's Bill's show and Bill's rules...and he makes that annoyingly clear to every guest who does not play the part of a "yes man".

Anyway, back to Franken and the afformentioned conversation. I made the statement at some point during a normal conversation that "I hope Al Franken, if he runs for Senate, can survive on the hill without 'Team Franken' backing him up." (for the uninitiated, "Team Franken" is a team of 14 Harvard students whom Franken has put on his payroll as fact checkers for his books and,I assume, his public speeches) My simple statement was that a Harvard education (which Franken has, albeit in "general studies"), some political views, a fact checking team, and good communication skills does not necessarily "make" a good politician.

At least, that's what I thought I said. Apparently I misspoke and said "Hitler was misunderstood, people with Multiple sclerosis are faking it, and I like to eat babies."....Honest mistake, must have gotten mixed up in my head.

But seriously, what followed my seemingly innocent statement was a barrage of arguments ranging from the simple and understandable (I don't think you're giving Al enough credit) to the slightly absurd ( NO one has made it to capitol hill without a team of people paid totell them how to think) to the just insulting (along the lines that I was being small minded and must just have it out for Al because he was once Stuart Smalley) I thought I was going crazy....wasn't my statement so much more innocent than any of that?

It's late and I'm actually pretty tired of thinkingabout this stuff, but I'll just make it short and say that I don't want Al Franken to run for office any more than I want Bill O'Reilly to run . Al has a little more tact in his delivery (although he can be just as misleading, as evidenced here: www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/frankenabs1.html ) but I just think they occupy the same societal space.They are agitators for their side of the political debate, and they both have a very strong tendency to write off and stop listening to people with whom they disagree. I don't want that in a politician, I want it on primetime TV for my personal amusement, but that's me.

OK, that was part of my rant...there was so much more to say, but I'm going to cut it short, wait for comments, and revisit this topic later. Feel free to post about Franken, O'Reily, my dumb ass...whatever. We'll come back to this after I've had a chance to breathe.