Yellow Pages

By Kent Bush
Posted Jul 02, 2009 @ 07:44 AM

They should disable the democratic process in Minnesota.

We can forgive you if you accidentally elect a pro wrestler as your governor. After all, even though you may have 10,000 lakes, they are frozen over most of the time and we are not going to move there.

But when you send a guy who played Stuart Smalley on Saturday Night Live to the Senate, you become a problem for all of us.

If you want to mess up your own room, that's your problem. If you mess up the whole house, then there will be consequences.

From now on, I think all governmental offices in Minnesota ought to be decided in an American Idol style competition. Only all contestants have to sing either Hannah Montana or Billy Ray Cyrus songs. In the even of a tie, Ryan Seacrest will select the winner.

That sounds ridiculous.

But six months ago, you would have said the same thing about Al Franken being elected to the United States Senate.

It doesn't matter what your political persuasion is. This guy wrote a book called "Rush Limbaugh is a big fat liar." That brings his ability to rationally debate an issue into question for me.

This is going to go one of two directions - and neither one is good.

He could go to Washington and "play the role" he thinks people expect and make a mockery of one of the highest offices in the land. We don't need a Senator doing his schtick during a filibuster.

The other scenario is actually more likely. Franken may become institutionalized and melt into the power structure of the Senate. This is much less embarrassing. But is that really what people of Minnesota want?

I don't think Franken will ever be taken seriously in states that don't share a border with Canada.

But he will be a Senator because he's good enough, he's smart enough, and doggone it, 312 more people voted for him.

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