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PZ Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris.
…and this is a pharyngula stage embryo.
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Ralph Reed likes to quote Alexis de Tocqueville on religion's central place in American democratic society. The quotations are not always accurate, but he is right about one important thing. Tocqueville, like Benjamin Franklin, believed that religion is essential to the health of republican liberty. However, Reed apparently closed the pages of Democracy in America too soon. Had he read further, he would not have missed Tocqueville's point that it is dangerous for religion to tie itself to political institutions and to topical political controversy.
Isaac Kramnick and R. Laurence Moore, The Godless Constitution: The Case Against Religious Correctness (New York: W.W. Norton, 1996), p. 21.
Pycnogonid tagmosis and echoes of the Cambrian
A complex regulatory network in a diploblast
Generating right-left asymmetries
Generic bumps and recycled genetic cascades
Upstream plasticity and downstream robustness in evolution of molecular networks
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Category: Politics
Posted on: April 5, 2006 9:02 PM, by PZ Myers
Please, please, please…I want to cast my vote for Al Franken in 2008, and I want him to be my representative in the Senate.
Why don't our official news media ever dig into the truth as plainly as our comedians?
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Comments
I'm already planning on being on his team here in SE MN.
Posted by: rmp | April 5, 2006 9:04 PM
Because comedians are willing to offend; politicians, never.
Posted by: Caledonian | April 5, 2006 9:07 PM
Al Franken and Jon Stewart. Now that's a winning ticket.
Posted by: buridan | April 5, 2006 9:37 PM
buridan beat me to it.
Franken/Stewart or Steward/Franken 08!
Posted by: Aa | April 5, 2006 10:14 PM
I meant Stewart...sigh...
Posted by: Aa | April 5, 2006 10:15 PM
Ha! Great read. Is the rest of the debate, or at least Coulter's response available somewhere?
Posted by: BrassyDel | April 5, 2006 10:35 PM
Here's a bit more from the uneven HuffPo: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/al-franken/an-evening-with-ann-coult_b_18529.html
Posted by: ArtK | April 5, 2006 10:49 PM
Why don't our official news media ever dig into the truth as plainly as our comedians?
I guess the comedians have it covered.
Posted by: Martin | April 5, 2006 11:07 PM
Please!!
Franken is a vile little bigot whose claim to fame is that his politics are just SLIGHTLY more enlightened than Rush Limbaugh's.
Let's see. He still uses the term "cut and run" to describe what every sane American wants--withdrawal from Iraq.
He actually posed with an Abu Ghraib ATTACK DOG over Christmas in a picture that makes him look more ridiculous than Dukakis driving a tank.
He has NO experience as an elected officer. At least when Minnesota last had a chance to elect an entertainer, Jesse Ventura had been a city mayor. Ventura had his crude moments but never as low as Franken's disgusting "joke" on PHC. To say that Franken has a cultural "tin ear" would be an insult to tin ears.
There must be at LEAST 10,000 Minnesotans with better credentials to be a Senator. Franken may have some moments as an entertainer, but let's be serious for a minute. Ventura was also entertaining, but really, do we want to do that again???
Posted by: eltechno | April 5, 2006 11:22 PM
It sounds like el Techno cannot distinguish comedy from commentary. I have listened to Franken's show, fairly regularly, and while it is a technical train wreck, it's funny, and I cannot recall him ever racially slurring anyone. In fact the only person I ever hear him raise his voice to is is dittohead friend Mark Luther in Colorado.
If I were in Minnesota, I'd be voting for him myself. Are you seriously saying I-grand-stand-in-front-of-foreign-dignitaries Coleman is better than Franken? Oh, and you don't need to be a political science PH.D to be senator. The republican party is obvious proof of that. Franken is a lot more informed than you give him credit for. And besides, Sonny Bono was a senator. Why can't Franken be one?
I think Stewart and Franken would be great press secretaries. They'd bust on all the crap that the media puts out there, and it would be one heck of a ride.
Posted by: BlueIndependent | April 6, 2006 12:26 AM
My vote is with Jim Hightower.
Posted by: Dustin | April 6, 2006 12:36 AM
Forget Franken-Stewart, we need Stewart-Colbert in 2008!
Posted by: Lisa | April 6, 2006 12:36 AM
Bono actually was a US Rep, although he did run for the Senate. He was mayor of Palm Springs before that too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonny_Bono
All that and still making albums with U2.
Posted by: JP | April 6, 2006 12:48 AM
There must be at LEAST 10,000 Minnesotans with better credentials to be a Senator.
And none of them are named Norm Coleman.
Posted by: natural cynic | April 6, 2006 12:58 AM
Ummm...
Bono in U2 != Sonny Bono of Sonny and Cher.
As for Senate...sure, why not.
Posted by: Azkyroth | April 6, 2006 1:48 AM
Hmmm. I remember Pat Paulsen's campaign. If eight-year-olds had the vote, he'd have gotten mine.
Sigh. I can only hope my discernment has improved slightly since then.
Posted by: Wesley R. Elsberry | April 6, 2006 2:42 AM
Al writes some funny books and sketches, but these are not qualifications to hold office.
-jcr
Posted by: John C. Randolph | April 6, 2006 7:38 AM
He also tells the truth, which may disqualify him for office.
Posted by: PZ Myers | April 6, 2006 7:41 AM
"Let's see. He still uses the term 'cut and run' to describe what every sane American wants--withdrawal from Iraq."
Huh. I'm not familiar with Franken's politics, but this really sounds disingenous. The Democrats want us out of Iraq, the Republicans want us out of Iraq, Bush wants us out of Iraq, and I'm pretty darn sure Franken wants us out of Iraq. But that's as opposed to us staying in Iraq forever ... The dispute is over the means and timetable for ending our involvement. And, for example, John Kerry's idea of an immediate total pullout is (IMO) aptly described as both 'cutting and running' and inane. We've massively fucked up their country, and we have an obligation to try to help fix it--a job that our armed forces are currently doing admirably, in the face of some determined opposition by some of the Iraqis. Some poor decisions have been made and are still being made at the highest levels of leadership-but to 'cut and run' would just be to add one more poor decision to the heap.
(And FYI: if it matters, I voted for Kerry in 2004.)
Posted by: Scott Simmons | April 6, 2006 8:30 AM
Since when is posing with attack dogs beyond the pale?
Posted by: Jessica Guilford | April 6, 2006 9:19 AM
Jessica, he discussed that on Letterman last night. He visited Abu Ghraib, and talked about what a difficult job the soldiers working there have. He's a dog lover, and noticed a particularly beautiful German shepherd. Later he went to lunch with her handler, who had guarded Saddam Hussein, and ran the dictator character part of his act by the handler, who said it was dead on for Hussein. I have no idea why any of that would be an issue.
(sorry if this posts twice; I got an error message the first time, and don't see it posted now)
Posted by: RavenT | April 6, 2006 9:40 AM
He also tells the truth, which may disqualify him for office.
Yeah, occasionally, between all the lies and hyperboles. The title of the book Lies is sefl-referential.
Posted by: Alon Levy | April 6, 2006 9:45 AM
Bush wants us out of Iraq,
What's your evidence for that?
Posted by: george cauldron | April 6, 2006 10:38 AM
Well, let's see. We had a president who thought members of the armed services wore costumes, and whose wife consulted astrologers, and he's considered a god by most republicans. Al Franken is orders of magnitude more qualified to hold high public office than that particular ex-president.
Posted by: Mark Paris | April 6, 2006 10:44 AM
"He also tells the truth, which may disqualify him for office."
Oh yeah...he's truthful. He's also a moron.
NY Times: Mr. Franken, you have said you did not know that your multi-million dollar paychecks were coming off the backs of the poor elderly and disadvantaged children that Gloria Wise is supposed to be serving. How then, sir, do you explain your signature mark on this legal document agreeing to re-pay those unfortunates?
Franken: I never read it..I just signed what ever they put under my nose; (eyes glaze) I know nothing except Bush lied and people died.
Pfft..The perfect PZ type progressive candidate for Senate!
Actually, I do hope that Franken runs. He's just the sort of shiney object we need to distract the children while the adults tend to business.
Go Al Go!
Posted by: swiftee | April 6, 2006 11:37 AM
Well, let's see. We had a president who thought members of the armed services wore costumes, and whose wife consulted astrologers, and he's considered a god by most republicans. Al Franken is orders of magnitude more qualified to hold high public office than that particular ex-president.
If Al Franken lets James Baker be in charge while we provides British monarchy-style humor, he'll make a good politician.
Posted by: Alon Levy | April 6, 2006 12:52 PM
If you pro-Iraq war types were really honest with yourselves and the rest of us, you wouldn't try to pass this off as your heart-felt concern for the Iraqi people and our "obligation" to set things right - give me a fricken break! You know that's bullshit and we know that's bullshit. Do you honestly think we buy any of this this crap?
You simply can't accept the fact that the U.S. (read Bush administration) has failed miserably. Why is this so difficult for you to admit? It was doomed from the start; our team lost; Elvis has left the building; the fat lady has finished singing; the opportunity to save face is long gone. Get over it and stop using the lives of U.S. soldiers and the Iraqi people as pawns in your game of denial!
Posted by: buridan | April 6, 2006 1:41 PM