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Slumming again

By Michael J. Smith on Tuesday August 7, 2007 12:39 PM

Yeah, yeah, I know, nostalgie de la boue and all that. Anyway, I've been prowling the tawdry corridors of Daily Kos again, and look at this gem:

http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/8/7/10724/63246

A Request for Help from the Kos Community
by davidsirota
Tue Aug 07, 2007 at 07:09:21 AM PDT

A few months ago, I told Kossacks that I was asked by Creators Syndicate to write a nationally syndicated, weekly newspaper column in the wake of the tragic death of our great hero Molly Ivins. Today, the column is being launched, and I need everyone's help.

Over the course of the next month, Creators will be letting newspaper editors all over the country know that I will start writing new columns for national publication in early September. The more these editors hear from you - their local readers - that you would like to see the column printed in your local papers, the better the chance there is that they will run the column.

So, if you support my writing and think we need a strong, progressive populist voice to counter the glut of right-wing syndicated columnists on the editorial pages of local newspapers, then please EMAIL OR CALL YOUR LOCAL EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS and let them know you'd like them to run my weekly Creators Syndicate column.

This somehow reminds me of the one time Al Franken was ever funny, back in 1979:

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/79/79fupdate.phtml

Al Franken: Thank you, Jane. Well, the "me" decade is almost over, and good riddance... I believe the 80's are gonna have to be different. I think that people are going to stop thinking about themselves, and start thinking about me, Al Franken. That's right. I believe we're entering what I like to call the Al Franken Decade. Oh, for me, Al Franken, the 80's will be pretty much the same as the 70's. I'll still be thinking of me, Al Franken. But for you, you'll be thinking more about how things affect me, Al Franken. When you see a news report, you'll be thinking, "I wonder what Al Franken thinks about this thing?", "I wonder how this inflation thing is hurting Al Franken?" And you women will be thinking, "What can I wear that will please Al Franken?", or "What can I not wear?" You know, I know a lot of you out there are thinking, "Why Al Franken?" Well, because I thought of it, and I'm on TV, so I've already gotten the jump on you.
David goes on to give his loyal readers and volunteer promoters a little Aunt-Polly advice:
Also remember that if you do get in touch with your editors, be respectful and polite. This is a big opportunity for the progressive movement to amplify our agenda, and I find that in the newspaper arena, we can be most successful if we avoid browbeating.
One gets the impression that David thinks some of his boosters are not too tightly wrapped, and worries that they might drive customers away rather than bringing 'em in the door.

Comments (3)

Wow. You mean, Franken was funny at one time?

Actually, I think I may have gotten a good laff off of him once or twice, but this may have been because he was on the same nights that the Grateful Dead were the guest band and, of course, all my buds and I were doing what we always loved to do, back in our slack college days, when the Dead were on SNL which was...well, what slack-assed college Deadheads loved to do back then.

So, Franken may have just seemed funnier that night.

MJS:

I did think the "me, Al Franken" bit was funny. Of course it's the old story -- a comedian says funny things, a comic says things funny, and this definitely belonged to the latter category. Every time Franken said the magic phrase his suety face would break out in a big smug shit-eating grin. And there was this little agogic accent -- me [slight pause, then very deliberately] Al Franken.

Or maybe it was just me. I wouldn't have the excuse you and your Deadhead friends probably had, but the routine seemed to suit Franken's persona so well -- turns out, in fact, that it probably suited his real personality too, even then.

mjosef:

The Franken quote is funny and apropos. Unfortunately, the "progressive movement" too often attracts men and women of enormous self-regard, in a line from the folk poets strumming their wordsmithery to the rockstar gods to the Asperger's professorial Ghandis and other megaphone marvels. Sirota is just another self-loving operator, though his tenure in AIPAC as a young grad may have helped him early into savior mode. For the most recent example, check the reaction after the poor braces-wearing steelworker made his incredibly moving entreaty to ask Edwards where America had gone wrong, and the maroon whiffed at this dream photo-op opportunity, turning the question of such calamitous importance into another opening into "It's all about me, John Edwards." No, it's not. It is not about any one idiot, ever, anywhere. It is about about the humble search for social betterment, one less stupidity at a time, by large groups, to re-align the the supersystem.

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