The Feminist & Al Franken

(NOTE: Blogger refuses to give me the paragraph breaks I want, no matter how many times I edit. Apologies. Struggle through as best you can. Also, a warning: two of the photos contain hateful words.)

The first mistake in public business is the going into it. Benjamin Franklin

Politics are almost as exciting as war, and quite as dangerous. In war you can only be killed once, but in politics many times. Winston Churchill

In politics as in the sickbed people toss from one side to the other thinking they will be more comfortable. Johann Goethe

Professional politicians like to talk about the value of experience in government. Nuts! The only experience you gain in politics is how to be political. Ronald Reagan

**~*~**
I once worked as an illustrator with the composer and librettist of the dark political musical, The Fix, adapting it into a cartoon novel. In The Fix, Machiavellian Grahame Chandler coaches his slacker nephew, Cal, on how to follow in the footsteps of his late Senator-cum-Presidential Candidate father, Reed.
"Don’t let yourself get thrown," Grahame vehemently preaches to Cal. "The upper hand, my boy…Nothing more important than the upper hand!"















In the book and film Primary Colors, Bill Clinton-caricature Jack Stanton froths in rage at his newbie strategist, Henry, for not briefing him properly concerning a political opponent. "You made me look like a f***in’ amateur!" he spits.


It seems that the worst crime in politics is not being an amateur, but looking like an amateur. No one gives their vote, or their money, to someone who makes stupid mistakes. Even a person running for City Council or State Rep for the first time must inspire confidence in the public and the players. It’s better if you are, but it’ll do just fine if you seem. Perception is reality.


That said, let us return to 25 March, to the Al Franken rally in St. Paul’s Capitol rotunda. (By the way, I later learned that the friendly gentleman I was sitting next to was Keith Ellison. And I startled Rep. Leon Lillie by suddenly saying hello. But he was very nice about it, and shook my hand warmly.)

Al Franken passed the test as an excellent political candidate, as far as I was concerned. Of course he was new at it. Every current politician was once an amateur. I vividly recall the hilarity among political talking heads, and a large amount of the American people, at the very idea of Ronald Reagan, the B movie actor, running for President! Franken had never held office, but he’d made a study of political power and influence, in reaction to the bile-spewing Right Wing radio talk show hosts. He was no naïve lamb.


This made his early stumbles cringe-worthy.


"How could he have forgotten to pay taxes?" I groaned. "How did he not know that his Playboy piece would come back to haunt him? Where the hell’s his Rapid Response Team?"


For a few weeks in early summer, Franken gave the impression of being a rank amateur. The minimum anyone who runs for office must expect is that anything from her or his past is fair –or unfair—game. Considering his face-offs with the Conservatives, how could Franken not have known this? If he had so much as unconsciously and briefly scratched his crotch during a hot, sweaty afternoon walk on the Harvard campus (yes, guys, I’ve seen you do it, with absolute obliviousness), then you could bet some scum rag newspaper would report that Al Franken had once been witnessed playing with himself in public. Worse yet, it wouldn’t be limited to scrum rag papers. The mainstream press jumps on any tidbit, no matter how rank the smell. Why hadn’t Franken and his team been ready for the sh*t storm when it hit the fan?


I drew back and reexamined Al Franken as a candidate for the United States Senate. How was he better and preferable to Norm Coleman, a pro about whom I knew very little? Over the summer I did a lot of research. Here, at (yes) very long last, through all the controversies, allegations, and vicious to sublimely ridiculous attack ads, is my conclusion.


I’ll leave better-informed essayists, bloggers and columnists to address in detail the issues of Franken’s taxes and lack of coverage of his company’s employees. Too many political wonks focus exclusively on the "issues" and "policies" to which a politician may robotically subscribe. I’m concerned with the human side of politicians. Who is the person, the human being, who wants to hold office? What is his heart? Can I identify with him?


I can identify with Franken.

I was paid a hefty advance to illustrate a nonfiction children’s picture book. When tax time came around, the H&R Block man informed me that I hadn’t paid my taxes on my advance. I’d assumed that my publisher had paid it for me. Big mistake. Not only did I have to pay Minnesota taxes on the advance, I had to pay Maryland taxes, because that was where my publisher was located. I promptly paid up, and there went my savings. I took note that you can assume you’re obeying the tax laws, and yet screw up magnificently.

Perhaps Franken should have been better informed. But then, he had an accountant. Why would you check every detail when you’re assuming that the person you’re paying to take care of things is indeed taking care of things?

Concerning taxes and benefits, Franken screwed up. When the screw-up was pointed out to him, he rectified it. It wasn’t malicious or despotic. It was human.

As a woman, and a Feminist, Franken’s Playboy satire left a bad taste in my mouth. I’ve only read a portion of it, and that online, so I have no idea whether what I read was what was actually published. But if it was, it was the same tacky sexual fantasy junk Playboy has always published.

So what? A gig’s a gig. How do I know? Because I’ve done it, too.

I used to be a political and satirical cartoonist. I was the first Comics Editor for my college newspaper, The Lookout (which was founded by my father, John Manion). Since I had few student contributors, I did most of the comic strips and panels myself. Many of them were extremely popular. And some got me in trouble. Some readers, including professors and college administrators, considered this cartoon, circa 1983, to be in very bad taste. And to be sexist. I still like it, and stand by it, even though the art is a lot cruder than I wish it were.

Back in the 1980s, when I was living with an abusive pot-head boyfriend, I tried to make quick money by submitting cartoons to Playboy. They were as tacky as Franken’s Playboy story. They had to be; that’s what Playboy wanted. They were never published. But if they had been, I’d have cashed Playboy’s check without blinking an eye. I certainly wasn’t sexist or anti-woman. But Mundanes, as my creative friends refer to the uncreative, lack the ability to separate and compartmentalize what one does for work, for a gig, from who one is. I can understand their problem. How can you write something tasteless without being tasteless? Well, you can enjoy a wretchedly tacky film without being wretchedly tacky. The creators of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 are obviously warm, brilliant writers and performers, and they luxuriate in incredibly awful films (Rent MST3K "Manos Hand of Fate." Watch with lots of popcorn and friends.).

I was once interviewed for a job with bookstores in my local airport. The manager said she’d Googled my name and was "distressed" by my Marketplace commentary about kids running wild in a bookstore. She was leery about hiring anyone who’d write something so angry and hostile.

I informed her that the commentary had received the largest popular response that Marketplace could remember in a long while, and I still get emails from people thanking me for saying what they wish they could. Writing commentaries about the angers and frustrations of the working poor is my job, but I didn’t confuse it with my job serving customers in retail. I told her that if she was worried, she had only to talk to my managers, my references, and look at my two 100% Secret Shops. But the manager couldn’t comprehend how I could be both angry satirist and very good salesperson.

We all of us puny human beings have a part of us that separates doing our job, being good members of society, being loving, faithful partners and parents, and laughing like hyenas at really tacky crap. There may be a few people who are pure through and through. I want nothing to do with them. I believe even Mr. Rogers probably enjoyed a good booger joke.

Al Franken wrote satire because he was a satirist. Sometimes, you write what makes the punters hoot, so you can cash the check and feed the kids. It’s not evil, it’s not wrong. It’s honest work.

Yes, Al Franken got very worked up, in print, on radio, concerning certain issues. Republicans mocked him when he said that he was passionate. These same Republicans have no problem whatsoever with Rush Limbaugh’s and Ann Coulter’s passionate rants. This is of course because the rants are in their favor. One must remember the tone of the times when Franken wrote Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot. Liberals were marginalized. Indeed, they’d marginalized themselves by being spineless. Right Wingers spit and snarled throughout the media, calling those whose mindset varied from their own everything from cowards to traitors, while Liberals weakly mumbled in protest, then shut up.

Franken spoke out when few would. He hit back with the same weapons Limbaugh and his ilk used. Even better, he knew how to use humor. Franken was effective and hilarious.

Now, years later, while Hannity, Coulter, and Limbaugh are still spewing devisiveness, and Republicans still support them, Franken is being attacked for his passion. Because, of course, the Right Wing can’t suffer opposition. It’s okay for them to vomit bile and call it "truth," but it’s not acceptable for anyone to question, state against, or, god help them, mock, their "truth." The Right Wing is evidently unfamiliar with hypocrisy and irony.

So, the "controversies" of Al Franken’s candidacy don’t bother me. Is that reason enough to not vote for Norm Coleman? Well, no.

We may find a nice allegory for why I won’t vote for Norm Coleman in a children’s PBS cartoon, Wordgirl. Seriously. Stick with me here.

Wordgirl is a ten year old girl from the planet Lexicon, who crash- landed on earth, and now lives under a secret identify as the adopted daughter of the Botsfords. As Wordgirl, she was helped by her friend, the brilliant scientist Dr. Bruce Boxleitner. (really, that’s his name.) Dr. Boxleitner was a sincere man, eager to do good and make the world a better place. But, like all brilliant scientists, the doctor had an ambition to dabble with power. He decided to mind-meld with his evil lab mouse, Squeaky (Wordgirl: "Why do you have an evil lab mouse?" Dr: "He was on sale."). The experiment went terribly wrong (they never just go "wrong"). Squeaky’s tiny evil mouse brain grafted to Dr. Boxleitner’s forehead, turning him into a brilliant EVIL scientist, Dr. Two-Brains. Dr. Two-Brains’ remaining urge to help the world battles with the tiny evil mouse brain’s urge to take over the world –and steal cheese and cheese-themed items. ("Mouse brain says—more cheese. Always-more-CHEESE.")

In 1971 Norm Coleman was probably a sincere and well-meaning young man. His actions demonstrated, literally, that he wanted to make the world a better place. He became a Democratic candidate, and took office with, probably, the dream of doing good.

But somewhere along the line, Coleman’s ambition urged him to dabble with power. Right at the time when Newt Gingrich was at his zenith, Norm switched from Democrat to Republican. Then Bush II came along, and Coleman joined his mind with an evil tiny mouse brain.

Thus he became:

(No, I don’t believe Bush is evil. Hitler was evil. Bush is reckless, misguided and destructive.)

I’ll leave it to others to examine Coleman’s flip-flopping, his D.C. apartment, and other issues. As I said, I’m concerned with the human aspect of candidates. I’m sure a part of Norm Coleman really believes he’s doing good for the world. His campaign ads said he’s "bringing people together." He’s said:

"The key to making a difference ... is to focus on a shared vision. The tough work is pulling people together, at times bridging a partisan divide. It's not good enough just to criticize, it's not good enough to tear something down. The business of serving the people is about making a difference and about doing something and not about fightin' about it but doin' something about it. I'm Norm Coleman and I approve this message."

But…how can you bring people together, when the people you associate with, and many of the policies you endorse, are nothing more than bigotry? I can’t, and won’t, judge who Norm Coleman the human being is. I can’t know his heart. But someone once said, "Show me your friends, and I’ll tell you who you are." Norm Coleman’s friends are no friends of mine.

Most of my friends are lesbians and bisexual women. Some are straight men and women with gay and lesbian friends and family. Many of my past and present coworkers are gay and bisexual men. These are people with good, true hearts. They stood by me through the worst of times. These are the people who Norm Coleman’s friends, and possibly himself, believe to be lesser human beings than themselves.

Norm Coleman opposes federal and state same-sex marriages and civil unions. As mayor of St. Paul, he voted against attempts to repeal a city law, which prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation. He refused to sign a St. Paul proclamation celebrating the annual Pride festival. In 1998, as he ran for Governor of Minnesota, his campaign aired radio ads that attacked his opponent, DFLer skip Humphrey, for his support of same-sex marriage. In 2004. Coleman pledged his support for a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would ban any state from recognizing same-sex marriage. In that same year, he voted to end a bi-partisan filibuster on that amendment.

Many point out that, in 1998, Coleman hired a transgendered person to be his deputy mayor. But that doesn’t change his stand on GLBT rights, nor his associating with Conservatives who actively work to deny lesbians, gays and bisexuals equality under the law.

This is key; the denial is under the law. A person may be prejudiced against any group, and rant and stew about those Others to his family and friends. He has that right. You can’t stop a member of the Neo-Nazis from having friends over for hotdish every Sunday, to complain how America is being taken over by those people. But under the law, a Neo-Nazi doesn't have the right to deny a black family from moving into his neighborhood.

You may say, hey, a lot of people agree with Norm Coleman about homosexuals. You may say, as many do, that this is a moral issue concerning the will of God.

Let me show you some people who sincerely believed they were acting morally, following the will of God:

Here are some more:

They look like such nice people, don’t they? Good, clean, upstanding citizens. They have bright, smiling faces. You can imagine them laughing and chatting as they can peaches, or the boy playing baseball with his friends. Such sweet, pure faces of hatred.

These people would have arrested my Filipino father for dating my white mother. They might have lynched him. Hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of Americans truly believed that evil propaganda, and inflicted violence upon those who opposed them, man, woman and child, no matter what the law said. Their God was above any law of man.

Today, the majority of us turn in disgust from such blatant ignorance. No one except fringe lunatics believes "race mixing" is Communism, or that integration is "unChristian." To use the morals of God to support and perpetuate such vileness is astounding and horrifying.

But why is this vileness in the name of God not only tolerated, but endorsed by many political candidates?

Those who believe in a God know now that the racists were wrong. But that same God is used as the justification for legislating inequality against particular groups of people, and for the same reasons: Ignorance and fear. Ignorance and fear that’s engendered in children from the moment they’re born.

Here’s the ultimate irony: A white child and a child of color, a child who may well be "mixed," sharing in their families’ hatred towards an Other, an other they're too young to understand.

I well expect that their parents are Pro-Life, and would happily see Roe v. Wade crushed. Their children are precious, from the moment of conception. Except if one of those two children in the picture came home and said, "I’m gay." Then, like thousands in the U.S., she or he would be thrown from the house, banished, the door slammed, the child dead to the parents. Such bigots believe in very late term abortions.

That’s the word for what Norm Coleman’s choices and for those of many, if not most, of his Republican associates: Bigotry.

From Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary:
big’ot-ed (adj) So obstinately attached to some creed, opinion, or practice as to be illiberal or intolerant
illiberal 1. Not liberal; esp., without a liberal education; lacking culture; ungentlemanly. 2. Indicating a lack of culture or breadth of view; bigoted. 3. Not generous; stingy.

Bigotry leads to violence, often to death. Those who support and perpetuate any legislation based on bigotry have to take responsibility for harboring an atmosphere of hate.

I don’t care that your God or Gods tell you that lesbians, gays and bisexuals are committing crimes against morals. You can’t say that someone has committed a crime if it isn’t a crime under the law. Otherwise, most of us could be stoned, hanged, or beheaded because something we did at some time offended someone’s idea of "morals" and "God's Law." The only reason to legislate against a specific group of people is bigotry. The only reason to deny legal equality is the belief that those whose rights you deny are not as human as you are.

I will not vote for Norm Coleman because his actions, and those of his "friends," are bigotry. I will not vote for bigotry. I will not vote into office anyone who would say to my dearest friends and best coworkers, "Look, you may be fine, upstanding citizens. But you're not as human as I am. You're immoral. I have the right to a job, to marriage, to housing, to adoption. But you don't. And I'm OK with that. Oh, by the way, vote for me on Tuesday."

I have no doubt that if my friends and I met Al Franken, he would greet us warmly. As equals. As human as he is, warts and all. Because we are, all of us, not sinners, but humans. We share humanity. I’ve seen and heard that in Al Franken time and again. He supports GLBT rights and same-sex marriage. He respects other "belief systems." He may vehemently disagree with people whose opinions oppose his own. But I can never imagine him passing legislation which would deny human rights to others which he himself enjoys. THAT’S the difference. That’s all the difference in the world between candidates.

Norm Coleman’s hands have been dirtied, probably not from maliciousness, but from ambition ill used. I’d be honored to shake Al Franken’s hand.