In this week’s episode, I talk with Michael Mann, Nobel Prize-winning climatologist for his work with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). We cover a lot of ground. How to talk about climate change to your crazy right-wing climate-denying uncle. “Uncle Hal, sea level is rising. For two reasons. Ice is melting. And water expands when it gets warmer.” If Uncle Hal insists sea level is rising because of all the rocks falling into the ocean, then just give up. We talk about how climate used to be a bipartisan issue, but since Citizens United, the Koch Brothers have threatened to primary any Republican who acknowledges the science. Addressing climate change has become a victim of our tribal politics. The answer right now? Win.

Here is the link to the podcast.

He also wrote Al Franken, Giant of the Senate, in case you didn’t know.

Also, did you know that I personally put Al Franken in the Senate?

Let me say at the outset, I’m biased. I like Franken, I think he is one of the best US Senators we’ve ever had in this country, in its entire history. I am very reluctant to let sophomoric or stupid behavior of many years ago cause us to lose this resource. I also know that his resignation is at least 50% likely, in part for reasons I will explore below, but I choose to remain in denial of this for a while longer, and that’s good enough for me.

It is hard to hear Leeann Tweeden’s story (in her own voice) and not want Al to resign, even though Leeann Tweeden herself has suggested he not. In fact, it is tempting to invent a truth machine we attach to all members of Congress, and ask about prior sexual harassment or abuse (especially while in Congress), get rid of them all, and replace them with women. We would almost certainly end up with a female-majority congress, and that could change the way this country works in several very positive ways.

(On the third hand, it should be on record so we do not forget, that Leeann Tweeden, while credible and clearly a smart and thoughtful person, is a FOX employee — off and on — and it is not hard to draw a line connecting the Roy Moore election and the present dust up. I am increasingly convinced that this is not relevant here but I feel the need to keep it on the table at least for now.)

Here is the Leeann Tweeden Interview and Al Franken’s Facebook apology. I think it is important for people to see both. Watch the entire interview, there is quite a bit of interesting insight here, across several subtopics, all the way to the end. It is long but it is your responsibility to see all of it before you form an opinion. Tweeden is very credible, Franken was a real jerk.

For his part, Al’s apology is very sincere, and as noted by Leeann Tweeden, comes from a place of honesty. One gets the sense after hearing Tweeden’s interview that the two of them could come to a reconciliation and Franken can go back to work in the Senate, were it up to her. I have a feeling that is now how it is going to work out, though.

The first thing I want to do is apologize: to Leeann, to everyone else who was part of that tour, to everyone who has worked for me, to everyone I represent, and to everyone who counts on me to be an ally and supporter and champion of women. There’s more I want to say, but the first and most important thing—and if it’s the only thing you care to hear, that’s fine—is: I’m sorry.

I respect women. I don’t respect men who don’t. And the fact that my own actions have given people a good reason to doubt that makes me feel ashamed.

But I want to say something else, too. Over the last few months, all of us—including and especially men who respect women—have been forced to take a good, hard look at our own actions and think (perhaps, shamefully, for the first time) about how those actions have affected women.

For instance, that picture. I don’t know what was in my head when I took that picture, and it doesn’t matter. There’s no excuse. I look at it now and I feel disgusted with myself. It isn’t funny. It’s completely inappropriate. It’s obvious how Leeann would feel violated by that picture. And, what’s more, I can see how millions of other women would feel violated by it—women who have had similar experiences in their own lives, women who fear having those experiences, women who look up to me, women who have counted on me.

Coming from the world of comedy, I’ve told and written a lot of jokes that I once thought were funny but later came to realize were just plain offensive. But the intentions behind my actions aren’t the point at all. It’s the impact these jokes had on others that matters. And I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to come to terms with that.

While I don’t remember the rehearsal for the skit as Leeann does, I understand why we need to listen to and believe women’s experiences.

I am asking that an ethics investigation be undertaken, and I will gladly cooperate.

And the truth is, what people think of me in light of this is far less important than what people think of women who continue to come forward to tell their stories. They deserve to be heard, and believed. And they deserve to know that I am their ally and supporter. I have let them down and am committed to making it up to them.

The Picture vs. The Mash

People on the internet are being stupid again. And I’m sorry if this offends you, but there is about at 70% chance that this applies to you. But don’t worry, it can be fixed.

There are two separate and distinct issues at hand, and many people are accidentally (so far, eventually this will become deceitful) conflating and confusing them.

THING 1: There is a photograph of Franken mugging a shot with his hands in grab position just over the thoracic area of Tweeden’s flack jacket, while Tweeden appears to be sleeping. You can see by the shadows, that Frankens’ hands are not touching her, and you can see by Franken’s facial expression that this is all some sort of stupid middle school level joke or prank. I’ve heard (subject to correction) that the person who took the picture claims that Tweeden is awake, and that this whole shot is a funny setup of a joke. If on the other hand she is asleep, it is a cruel prank.

THING 2: The other thing is the rehearsal mash. A mash is a forceful unwanted kiss. Or, it could be a kiss that is not unwanted but ends up being forceful in an unwanted way. According to Tweeden, Franken insisted on rehearsing a kiss they were planning as part of a skit he wrote, and she did not want to do that. He kept insisting and eventually she acquiesced, and when it happenned, according to Tweeden, Franken kissed her very forcefully (see the video) and in an unwanted manner. For his part, Franken says he remembers it differently but has not elaborated on what that means.

Here’s the THING. Even though the photograph is stupid and embarrassing, and possibly abusive, it does not illustrate the mash. They are two different things. Now you know.

Support Our Troops: Forgive Franken

Watch this USO show. Take note of the remarks about shooting into a village that it was illegal to shoot at, the fecal humor, and the sexual humor. This is what the troops want, this is what USO gives them. Have a look.

Bad behavior is not excused by bad context, but it is potentially explained that way. Should we have USO shows that make light of war crimes, and that use bawdy humor to entertain the troops? Some will say yes, this is what keeps up morale, this is how we support our troops. I expect everyone who would make such an argument to come to Franken’s defense regardless of their political motivation!

Early Stages

Hollywood and the world of entertainment are reeling (no pun intended) with the accusations and revelations, firings and resignations. People are identifying, correctly, not only the US Congress but also various state legislatures, as places where male harassment of females is widespread and largely unchecked. Corporate America outside of Entertainment is so far not too affected, but that is not for long, probably.

Those cultures have to change. So do places like the USO as well, places where bad behavior is rewarded and held up as morale building.

And sports. Don’t get me started on sports.

I do wonder why this is all happening right now. I know why it is happening now instead of, say, during the middle ages. But I don’t know exactly why it is happening now as opposed to, say, 2011 or some other recent year. I also wonder why the dam burst when someone took their finger out of the hole known as Harvey Weinstein, and not back with Cosby. Is that a race thing? Supreme White society expects such things of an African American entertainer? Or was it just unclear to women what the consequences of coming out would be then. Maybe it DID start with Cosby, that was an important dry run.

And of course Trump being president has caused a reset, a re-calibration, a regrouping, across the board with respect to all the issues, especially those surrounding gender and race. That may be part of it.

In the end, I hope we can save Al Franken but I know we probably can’t, and maybe shouldn’t even want to.

If Al Franken resigns, Governor Mark Dayton will appoint a senator. It will be a female. Who will it be?

And, in my next post, I predict the future: How The Franken Thing Is Going To Play Out

You probably know who Al Franken is, but just in case, he is a former satirist, frequent USO performer, SNL star, and now, United States Senator from Minnesota. He is famous for his vigorous championship of good things in a bad place.

Earlier today Tweeden made an accusation against Senator Al Franken, claiming that he gave her an unwanted kiss during rehearsal for a comedy skit on a USO tour. There was also a mildly inappropriate and rather sophomoric photo that Tweeden included in her public complaint.

For those who are not on Facebook, here is Al Franken’s statement, of just a short time ago, regarding the recently revealed activities while on a USO tour several years ago:

The first thing I want to do is apologize: to Leeann, to everyone else who was part of that tour, to everyone who has worked for me, to everyone I represent, and to everyone who counts on me to be an ally and supporter and champion of women. There’s more I want to say, but the first and most important thing—and if it’s the only thing you care to hear, that’s fine—is: I’m sorry.

I respect women. I don’t respect men who don’t. And the fact that my own actions have given people a good reason to doubt that makes me feel ashamed.
But I want to say something else, too. Over the last few months, all of us—including and especially men who respect women—have been forced to take a good, hard look at our own actions and think (perhaps, shamefully, for the first time) about how those actions have affected women.

For instance, that picture. I don’t know what was in my head when I took that picture, and it doesn’t matter. There’s no excuse. I look at it now and I feel disgusted with myself. It isn’t funny. It’s completely inappropriate. It’s obvious how Leeann would feel violated by that picture. And, what’s more, I can see how millions of other women would feel violated by it—women who have had similar experiences in their own lives, women who fear having those experiences, women who look up to me, women who have counted on me.

Coming from the world of comedy, I’ve told and written a lot of jokes that I once thought were funny but later came to realize were just plain offensive. But the intentions behind my actions aren’t the point at all. It’s the impact these jokes had on others that matters. And I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to come to terms with that.
While I don’t remember the rehearsal for the skit as Leeann does, I understand why we need to listen to and believe women’s experiences.
I am asking that an ethics investigation be undertaken, and I will gladly cooperate.

And the truth is, what people think of me in light of this is far less important than what people think of women who continue to come forward to tell their stories. They deserve to be heard, and believed. And they deserve to know that I am their ally and supporter. I have let them down and am committed to making it up to them.

[source]

I trust the good and thoughtful people of Minnesota to come to terms with the Al Franken thing, in a way that is reasonable and appropriate.
I have no idea what that will look like, but I honestly do think the process will involve a civilization-advancing conversation, because that is what we do here in Minnesota. Three out of five times, anyway.

But I digress.

You need to do this before any upcoming elections. Find out who on the ballot has a record of opposing guns vs. who has a record of supporting guns, and vote against the gun supporters and for the gun opposers.

I made a list of current members of the Minnesota US Congressional delegation, and put it at the top of the post, with relevant information. I also looked some details up from HERE and HERE.

In a recent rating of recent and current members of the Minnesota House delegation, the NRA gave Rick Nolan, Keith Ellison, and Betty McCollum the grade of “F” and none of these three lawmakers have taken money from them.

Collin Peterson took $2,500 bucks from the NRA, Michele Bachmann took $3,500, Erik Paulson took 2,250, John Kline $2,500, and Tim Walz took $2,000. They all got a rating of “A” from the NRA.

Notice that party lines are being crossed here.

During the recent congressional session, Congresspersons Betty McCollum and Keith Ellison supported zero bills that support guns, but have supported 14 gun control bills.

Richard Nolan has supported one gun control bill.

Al Franken has supported two gun control bills.

Amy Klobuchar has supported two gun control bills.

Those are the clear good guys in Congress from Minnesota. But you might ask why the great variation in number of bills?

Congressman Erik Paulsen has supported one gun rights bill and has not supported any gun control bills. Collin Peterson has supported three gun rights bills and zero gun control bills. Tom Emmer has supported zero gun control bills and five gun rights bills. John Kline has supported a whopping nine gun rights bills and zero gun control bills.

From Senator Al Franken – #1 bestselling author and beloved SNL alum – comes the story of an award-winning comedian who decided to run for office and then discovered why award-winning comedians tend not to do that.

This is a book about an unlikely campaign that had an even more improbable ending: the closest outcome in history and an unprecedented eight-month recount saga, which is pretty funny in retrospect.

It’s a book about what happens when the nation’s foremost progressive satirist gets a chance to serve in the United States Senate and, defying the low expectations of the pundit class, actually turns out to be good at it.

It’s a book about our deeply polarized, frequently depressing, occasionally inspiring political culture, written from inside the belly of the beast.

In this candid personal memoir, the honorable gentleman from Minnesota takes his army of loyal fans along with him from Saturday Night Live to the campaign trail, inside the halls of Congress, and behind the scenes of some of the most dramatic and/or hilarious moments of his new career in politics.

Has Al Franken become a true Giant of the Senate? Franken asks readers to decide for themselves.

As the person who personally got Al Franken elected to office the first time around, I’m sure I’m in this book in several places. I haven’t checked yet, but I thought you should know about the book.

Joseph Bryson Greenwald, 6 lbs 11 oz. We are awaiting word on the baby’s length.

Bachmann almost lost her re-election to challenger Jim Graves last year. I’m convinced that had the election been held a few weeks later, Graves would have won. Recently, internal polling data from within Bachmann’s campaign became known, and showed that as of a couple of weeks ago Bachmann was actually behind Graves. Bachmann’s response to this polling was an ad buy; the Bachmann campaign started up early with local ads, clearly indicating one thing and strongly suggesting another. For one, Bachmann had decided to run for re-election as of several days ago. She bought campaign ads. That’s pretty clear. Two weeks ago or less, Michele Bachmann was a candidate for re-election to the sixth district and was spending money on that campaign. This is a fact that must be taken into account in figuring out what is going on. The second thing this indicated was that she was nervous about the polling data and felt compelled to start early.

Then, suddenly, she announced that she would not be running. You don’t decide to run for re-election and actually craft campaign ads and buy air time for the ads and put on the air if you are not running. “I’m Michele Bachmann and I approved this message” means, very clearly, that she was in fact running for re-election. Why, then, did she suddenly stop running for re-election? Even with poor polling numbers, this does not make sense. The polling numbers were not abysmal. She was about five points behind, very close to the margin of error. This is not a number that in and of itself would recommend abandoning a campaign. Also, the numbers were known to her campaign before the ad buy.

There are two other possible explanations for her withdraw, I think. One is that something bad is about to happen and she is bugging out before that occurs. The other is that she noticed that there was another office up for election and has decided to run for it. Let’s examine those two possible explanations.

The most likely explanation for her withdraw is probably that her recent attempts to negotiate away a law suit being filed against her failed and she’s about to be dragged into her own little Watergate, or other civil or criminal legal problems loom that her campaign knows more about than we do at present:

Someone from Michele Bachmann’s 2012 presidential campaign team stole an email list off of Barb Heki’s laptop. This list was from the evangelical home school organization for which Heki played a leadership role… She sued.

…

Today, the court scheduled the trial.

… and later that day Bachmann made her video bowing out of the campaign.

A second explanation is that Bachmann noticed that the Junior Senator from the State of Minnesota, Al Franken, is up for re-election and, at the time she made her plans to announce her withdraw, had no serious challengers. This is the preferred explanation among local Minnesota pundits. Why? Not because it is the best explanation, but because it is the coolest explanation. Al Franken only barely won his seat during the last election, but there are very specific reasons for that, and these reasons simply don’t apply today. Senator Franken went from never having held elected office to being one of the most respected and effective Senators in Washington. How did he do that? He is a) very sincere about his public service and b) very smart. Well, also, his hard work and the excellent support from his family and staff and all that too. Bottom line: The people of Minnesota understand that Al Franken is a great senator and he will be re-elected.

Al Franken isn’t just a great Senator, but he is also one of those guys we watch for the entertainment value, and I’m not referring here to his earlier career as a comedian satirist. Have you seen him in action? Here’s an example. I would not have wanted to have been a grasshopper living in Little Al Franken’s yard when he was a little boy in Ednia, Minnesota.

That was Subtle Al. Here’s another:

Here’s Al with a very smart witness trying to trip him up. Starts at about 1:27:

Not in chambers, about Fox, and reforming our Math education system at the same time:

And here is Al Franken eating a lawyer before lunch:

For comparison, here is Michele Bachmann:

Can you imagine it? A Franken-Bachmann campaign? Pure Political Squeee. Bwahahaha to the Nth power.

So, you can see that no matter how unlikely it may be that Michele Bachmann would actually have quit her seat in the house in order to run against Al Franken, we insist on keeping it on the table as a possibility because, well, it is something to live for.

There is a third possible explanation for Michele Bachmann’s withdraw; A better offer from Fox or some other corporation. This has been suggested by various commenters but I think it unlikely. Yes, expect such a thing to occur at some time in the future, but I believe that Bachmann truly sees herself as a savior of The Constitution and will generally act with that motivation before other considerations. Of course, the first and third explanations can be linked. If she is facing high costs from impending legal battles, bowing out and getting a nice contract with Faux News would be the thing to do.

Finally, I would like to express my great relief that Bachmann is bowing out. It has been a great burden to me … as the person who got her political career started, feeling responsible all these years for having created this particular horror. Now, finally, I’ll be able to sleep nights.

Stay tuned. And, beware of falling boots.

I personally put Al Franken in the Senate

Al Franken is about to be seated as the Junior Senator from Minnesota after a long and costly battle between loser Norm Coleman and Senator Franken. Al won the election by just a few hundred votes, and three of those votes are mine.

So, we have me and about 100 other people just like me to thank for overthrowing the Coleman Regime. Let this be a lesson to all of you who have the opportunity to vote and do not, or who have the opportunity to go out and work for a few hours for a candidate but do not. You are missing out.

How did I get three (or maybe more) votes for Al? Well, one of them was me. I voted for him, so that’s one vote. The other two were trickier.

For months before the election, numerous volunteers carried out a well organized campaign on behalf of a number of Democratic Party candidates. During this time, I did not do that much for Al. I blogged for him, and I donated some money, went to one fund raiser, and so on, but most of my grassroots work was for my local congressional candidate, Ashwin Madia. But the way things are organized here, you end up doing stuff for the whole ticket, so I found myself on the phone talking to people about Madia, Franken and Obama. For several weeks, most of those phone calls were to people who either hated Democrats or were already voting for the Democrats. I don’t think I convinced anyone to change their mind, and I probably didn’t convince anyone who was not planning to vote to go out and cast their balllot. But, I and thousands of other volunteers did, incrementally, add important detail to the database off of which we were making these calls. Which led eventually to the moment of truth.

The moment of truth was the weekend before election, when this database is used to deploy volunteers across the landscape to personally visit likely Democratic Ticket voters to make sure they are on board, make sure they know when and where to vote, and make sure they are really going to go and do it.

It was a breezy, sunny day with a lot of dead leaves laying around all over the place. The leaves are good because they bring people out of their houses. This way you can walk around on the streets and talk to people without having to knock on every single door. Most people you talk to while canvassing are in fact inside their houses and you’ve got to knock on the doors, but if you can get someone outside raking their leaves and don’t have to ring their doorbell the conversation almost always goes better because they feel less intruded upon.

So one of the votes I got was simple. This was a person who was totally into voting for Franken (and Obama and Madia). She was a fairly recent immigrant from East Africa. She had been informed, I think by a Republican Operative, that she could vote on line, and thus was planning to be out of town. I helped her to understand that this was not true, and got her to change her plans, and showed her where to vote and so on. I’m pretty certain she went and voted for Franken because of this conversation, and otherwise, may not have.

The other vote was a bit tricker. I was heading for one of the houses of possible Franken supporters but the guy who lived there was out in front raking leaves. So we started talking. He was a recently retired police officer. I started the usual patter by asking if he was going to vote for Madia.

“Sure, I like him. Definitely voting for him.”

Then I asked about Franken.

“No. What an asshole.”

He did say he’d be voting for Obama. On further questioning, he told me that he had gone to school with Franken, and that he was a total jerk, and he just couldn’t bring himself to vote for the guy. I agreed, hey, if you’re going to be an asshole in grade school, you’ve gotta pay the consequences later on when you want to run for Senator. Some people won’t vote for you.

And I left that issue to the side (for the moment) and we started talking about other things. We talked about veterans and the war, education, health care, all the issues of the day, and he had a pretty much straight down the line Democratic Farmer Labor party position on each one. As does Franken, for the most part.

Then we got to the idea of the Congress becoming Democratic and Obama winning. We talked about how the house was going to be overwhelmingly Democratic, but that it would be really close in in the Senate. Without mentioning Franken by name, we talked about how the difference between a filibusterer-busting majority of 60 and a not quite adequate majority of 59 would be one senator. We talked about how some of the races were going to be really close, and this could come down to just a few votes.

We had covered a lot of ground, and we stood there for a moment catching our breath, silently watching the leaves he had raked up redeploying themselves across the lawn in the erratic northeasterly Fall breeze that reminds us Minnesotans that Winter is never far away. Silently, we just let our own thoughts have their way for a moment or two.

Then I said to him, “Your voting for Al, arent’ you …” Not a question. Just a friendly statement.

“Yea. I will,” he said. “Damn him.”

“It will be funny if he wins by one vote,” I said.

“Yea. It would,” he said. And I walked away.

And at roughly the same time, on the same afternoon, one hundred other Democrats each stepped solemnly away from the lawn or front porch of a voter who, because of the conversation they just had, was now going to vote for Al.

It is too bad, in a way, that 99 of us didn’t fail to do our jobs that day. Because if Al actually did win by one vote … well, that would be really funny.

^{Photo courtesy of Chad Davis}