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Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats. Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration’s failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact. The sources said Franken was the most outspoken senator in the meeting, which followed President Barack Obama’s question-and-answer session with Senate Democrats at the Newseum on Wednesday. But they also said the Minnesotan wasn’t the only angry Democrat in the room. “There was...

The twittersphere is awash today with concern that today's Senate race in Massachusetts could become a repeat of Franken v. Coleman. And judging by a recent story from Politico, the stars might just be aligning. The website reports this afternoon that Al Franken's lead attorney during the recount, Marc Elias, "has arrived in Massachusetts to head up the Democratic legal team."

Coakley Campaign To Sound Alarm On Reported Ballots Pre-Marked For Scott BrownEric Kleefeld | January 19, 2010, 5:34PM The Martha Coakley campaign just sent out a media advisory, announcing a press conference at 5:30 p.m. ET, alleging irregularities in the special Senate election. The press conference will involve reports of voters who received ballots that were already marked for Republican candidate Scott Brown. It should be noted that the Coakley campaign will have on hand as an attorney one Marc Elias, who was previously the head recount lawyer for Al Franken in Minnesota, a legal drama that lasted for eight...

Destroying the integrity of U.S. elections has been a longtime project for the far left. For over a decade, elected Democrats have manipulated the American people into believing their counterfeit altruistic intentions to enable more citizens to vote. Though largely flying under the radar, they’ve been looking for ways to use our legislative system to trump up fraudulent votes and their subterfuge knows no boundaries. In 1993 Congress passed the National Voter Registration Act, commonly called “motor voter.” Under the deception that it would boost voter turnout, the bill laid the foundation for much of the voter fraud we’ve seen...

Fresh from a tour of Afghanistan, Sen. Al Franken expressed modest support this week for the president's plan to drastically expand America's presence in the war, now in its eighth year. The Minnesota Democrat previously was uncommitted on whether the U.S. should deploy 30,000 more troops to the region. Speaking to reporters Wednesday from an airport in Dubai, Franken said he will back Obama's plan and is "cautiously optimistic" about the war's progress. Franken made the taxpayer-funded trip to Afghanistan and Pakistan with Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich. It was Franken's fifth trip to Afghanistan, his first...

Scott Brown on the hustings: Will Ted Kennedy's government health care dream die at the hands of his successor? APPolitics: Democrats seated two senators under shady conditions and rewrote a state election law to keep their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Now they plan to deny Scott Brown entry if he wins Ted Kennedy's seat. The fate of health care reform may very well hinge on the Jan. 19 special election in Massachusetts to fill the seat of Kennedy, for whom passage has been touted as a sort of final tribute to this champion of the nanny state. As Democratic...

In a nod to the growing Hmong populations in Minnesota and Wisconsin, the states’ four U.S. senators teamed up in a joint statement Tuesday opposing the Thai government’s plans to forcibly repatriate more than 4,000 Hmong refugees back to Laos. The four Democrats, Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken of Minnesota and Russ Feingold and Herb Kohl of Wisconsin, say they “strongly condemn” the Thais’ decision, which they say ignores the objections of the United Nations, the U.S. Government, and international human rights groups. The statement reads in part: “We share the concern of many of our Hmong-American constituents whose loved...

Video of Barney Frank singing "Banking Queen" to tune of ABBA's Dancing Queen.

When Sen. Al Franken, Minnesota Democrat, was a comedian, he was never that funny. Take the title of his book "Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot" - that's some high-quality humor there. Clever, daring and yet so second grade. But when Minnesotans elected him to the Senate, Mr. Franken promised that those days were behind him and that he would work hard to win over his colleagues. So far, his presence in the Senate is making it a less civil place. If the old Mr. Franken were to write a book about it, the title might be "Al Franken...

Twice recently, Mr. Franken's obnoxiousness was on public display. On Dec. 14, after having missed most of a talk by Sen. John Thune, Mr. Franken tore into him, time after time accusing the South Dakota Republican of being dishonest by claiming that the Senate bill would hike taxes immediately while delaying the "spending benefits."

Al Franken, the Democrat from Minnesota who won election to the Senate after a successful career as a comic and author, has begun to show the sharp-tongued side of his personality by ripping into GOP staffers behind the scenes.

We all sicken at the thought of the trillions of dollars being wasted by the Obama administration under the pretext of economic stimulus (18 million dollar websites, etc.) And we all have to restrain ourselves from throwing our shoes through the television as we watch the openly defiant nefarious dealings by the arrogant corrupt mental midgets in congress rush passage of their ill fated health care plan. But we should take a moment to regress a little. Two months prior to the 2008 election President Bush, under the reprehensible misguided advice of Hank Paulson (Secretary of the Treasury), rushed to...

A Congressional Research Service report commissioned by the House Judiciary Committee says ACORN hasn't violated any federal regulations the past five years. The report, released by Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers's, D-Mich., staff Tuesday evening, also reports that the undercover filmmakers that allegedly caught employees of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now breaking the law may have violated state law in their filming operation.

Without sixty votes in the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) would not be able to invoke cloture, or cut off debate. Anything short of sixty would allow a filibuster and doom Obama’s health care plan. The present 60-vote majority is artificial, the result of undemocratic means. Consider how three of these votes came to be: Roland Burris- Appointed by Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich just prior to his removal, Democratic leaders including Harry Reid pledged that he would never be seated. Barack Obama, along with other Democratic officials in Illinois, called for a special election to fill the seat. When...

Congress has been working on a health care bill for the better part of a year. The coverage of the legislation inevitably takes on a day-to-day, blow-by-blow account of the political machinations in Washington, D.C. The public option is in, then it's out, then maybe it's in with a trigger, then it's out, then maybe Medicare is expanded to include some as young as 55, then that's out. The legislation will have changed more between the time we write this and you read it. Anything to come up with 60 votes in the Senate in a big hurry. What's easy...

Al Franken joked about rape in a skit on SAturday Night Live while he was a writer on the show. EXCERPT "MN GOP Hits Franken Over Rape Joke In 1995 Article" ST. PAUL (AP) Democrat Al Franken's past work again complicated his present bid to become a U.S. senator, when Republicans on Thursday circulated 13-year-old quotes of him joking about rape while co-writing a skit for "Saturday Night Live............"

Since I posted some audio of Senator Al Franken (D-MN) sending me to his press secretary recently, Mr. Franken has acted up quite a bit on the Senate floor in an unusual fashion for a freshman senator. He had an intense exchange with Senator John Thune (R - S.D.), the number four Republican in the GOP leadership, on Monday after Mr. Franken introduced a motion for the health care bill to change an excise tax to surtax(video below).

Sorry for the vanity folks, but I stumbled across this video last night. It's a couple years old, before Al Franken was shaming the state of Minnesota as a Senator. An excerpt from a public forum featuring he and Ann Coulter, I think this so perfectly encapsulates Franken's weaselly methods in his attempts to smear conservatives as "liars," that it deserved addressing. Please take a few minutes to watch. Then, take a minute to read the ACTUAL ARTICLE by Thomas Friedman in question, and come back for my commentary. Now, did you notice what Franken did there? He started in...

A hearing has been scheduled for Tuesday before Judge Nina Gershon on whether Congress can ban federal funds to ACORN. Rep. Darrell Issa, ranking Republican on the House Government Reform committee, released this statement: “Next week, the federal government has the opportunity to vigorously defend what the President signed and Congress overwhelmingly passed—a bipartisan recognition that ACORN is not fit to receive federal funds to perform duties on behalf of the American people. After hearing the government's case, hopefully Judge Gershon will reconsider her previous ruling and the taxpayers will no longer be forced to subsidize this criminal organization." Last...