AL FRANKEN KNOCKS DOWN DEAN HECKLER (N ot Satire)

“"Look's like y'all wrote a check that yer ass Republicaint cash....."

Who said anything about Republicans? Do we now get to call you a Communist so everyone feels better?

Seems to me conservatives like Buck and liberals like Laqtis are blowing this out of proportion. Who gives a rat's ass what Franken does?”

“Ha ha! Blowing it out of proportion? That's the fun of it. Al who? I'm just goofin' with this fun story... talk about blowing things, laqtis is taking this so serious I think he's 'bout ready to blow a vein! Ha ha! Apart from politics, I think Al Franken is a funny dude!”

“I'm NOT a liberial (for the last time) and why is it that you think I was talking to you?”

“I'm proud to be a Liberal.


Buck Fush!”

“(gasp) UMMmmMM! Tilt! I'm telling! You said the "L" word!”

“Laqtis is not a liberal, he just bashes conservatives... I say be what you want, and be proud of it, like my friend Tilt. He's a liberal, doesn't mind who knows it, and was fun to hang out with some at Cumberland Gap.

And by the way, a big F you to Albert Schlecht for screwing up the thread.”

“Just to keep ya up on events, Stick, I am a former "hardcore" or neocon (if you want to use that term) Repubulican. I am an independant voter now and pround of it. You and others can "classify" me all y'all want, but understand that there are plenty more just like me out there, so you see, there's more to what's going on than Dem and Reps. Y'all have peeps, disenchanted peeps like me. We are the "Undecideds". We are sick and tired of the way Bush has run this country in the ground. People around here just have a bad habbit of jumping to conclusions that if they bash a Rep, they're a Dem. You know what "they" say about assuming....”

“Al Franken just got back from Iraq and his 4th USO tour. What
an a-hole, huh? Where were Jay Leno and Dennis Miller?”

“Man, that guy is busy! Busting heads and jetting all over the world. Seriously, a entertainer that gives there time to put a little pep in the step of our men and women in uniform goes up in my book, no matter who it is. Too bad it's not safe enough in Iraq to throw a nice one for them. They could use a little pep. Maybe the Pres should fuel up AF1 again and make the rounds...... and take Chaney with him.....”

“"Who said anything about Republicans? Do we now get to call you a Communist so everyone feels better?........"

PS - My "Republicaint" slang is a direct result of me being called a Commie over and over again. So, tomAto, tomOto.....”

“"Conclusion: The rabid right is fearful when they realize liberals aren't a bunch of pussies."

While I am far from being a rabid righty I will however always think that you are a pu$$y.”

“Hey, buck, back around post 50-something, you said a group was just as worthless as the UN. Didn't the UN turn out to be right all along about WMD? Doesn't that mean that shrub and the other chickenhawks are the useless ones? It seems the UN was right not to back war criminals and murderers like shrub and his handlers and puppetmasters. I remember Rush "10 felonies" Limbaugh saying "The UN inspectors were FAILURES because they didn't find the WMDs which ARE THERE". Where's the neo-con appology? I guess convicted criminals like shrub or rush don't feel they ever need to appologize for their lies. What lie did shrub say, you ask? I heard him one year ago say "We have FOUND the weaponsh of mash deshtruction." The misspellings were intentional, meant to convey the way shrub slurs his speach due to his alcohol induced brain damage. He will soon be dumped on the trash heap of history where he has always belonged.”

“"Hey, buck, back around post 50-something, you said a group was just as worthless as the UN. Didn't the UN turn out to be right all along about WMD?

Hi Slugman! I think you are misunderstanding a basic premise of this whole issue. The UN didn’t turn out to be “right”, as the UN didn’t say Saddam was free from WMDs. In fact, just the opposite is true. There were numerous UN Resolutions stating that Saddam had WMDs and needed to account for them all. Saddam refused to account for all his WMDs according to the UN mandates and was in violation of the many UN Resolutions. Why do you say “the UN was right”? Saddam was in violation all over the place with the United Nations. The UN even granted the use of “force” if Saddam wouldn’t cooperate in fully disclosing his WMD program. Many members of the UN sided with the United States in thinking war was necessary to remove Saddam since he wouldn’t comply with these UN Resolutions. Many others in the UN thought more inspections and containment was a better approach to Saddam’s WMDs.

He will soon be dumped on the trash heap of history where he has always belonged.

So I take it you won’t be voting for him come Novemember? :^D”

“Laqtis you assume that I assume that you're a democrat. I assume that you assume that I am not a democrat. I assume that you get stressed out over this whole deal. In return, I'll let you assume that I am wrong. Anyone else want to assume that we've run the Al Franken saga into the ground?”

“Laqtis you assume that I assume that you're a democrat. I assume that you assume that I am not a democrat. I assume that you get stressed out over this whole deal. In return, I'll let you assume that I am wrong. Anyone else want to assume that we've run the Al Franken saga into the ground?”

“I say we change the subject. Hey, has anyone here ever stepped on a squid?”

“Sounded so good I had to post it twice I guess.”

“Sticky, it's not nice to pick on other people's religion man. I've been to Q's house and seen his Al Franken shrine. Lay off dude.”

“This whole Al Franken episode is the most important issue facing the world today. Even greater than Michael Jackson or Scott Peterson. I will not be drawn off-topic.”

“Yes, you have opened my eyes Violin. I was foolish not to see it's significance in world history. Ranks with the O.J. trial as a benchmark issue.”

“Buck, you are confusing UN resolutions about Iraq with UN WMD inspection reports. I am refering to the fact that UN inspectors kept not finding WMDs, and the neo-con talk radio types saying the WMDs are there, but the UN people are just stupid puppets being led around by the nose by Saddam. Rush cited as proof that the inspectors were incompetent the fact that they couldn't find the WMDs, which he said are obviuosly there, since we have "proof". Well, obviuosly the inspectors were right, and weren't incompetent. And your point about UN resolutions only makes UN critics sound worse, not better. Apparently the sanctions and resolutions and embargos and no-fly zones WAS enough to make him disarm his WMD program. Didn't help him, though did it? So why would North Korea disarm, knowing that shrub would invade anyway? The message shrub has sent is "if you have nuclear or other powerfull weapons, better keep them and use them if attacked, otherwise you're toast". We will suffer the tragic effects of this mis-begotten administration for decades to come, even if we kick him out in November. Even many Republicans are steamed at his arrogance (undermining a new law on nuclear safety) and incompetence (underestimating medicare costs by at least $125 billion).”

“I am refering to the fact that UN inspectors kept not finding WMDs

...and Saddam kept not disclosing where his known but unaccounted for WMDs were, hence the continual status of being in violation of U.N. Resolutions.

Rush cited as proof that the inspectors were incompetent the fact that they couldn't find the WMDs

Sorry, I don't listen to Rush, and even if I did, Rush has no say with official United Nations policy, which declared Saddam in illegal possession of WMDs because he wouldn't account for the known WMDs he previously had.

Apparently the sanctions and resolutions and embargos and no-fly zones WAS enough to make him disarm his WMD program.

Read your statement above. How do we know that sanctions and embargos and no-fly zones was enough to disarm his WMD program? BECAUSE WE FLIPPIN' WENT IN THERE AND VERIFIED IT! You couldn't make that statement unless someone went in there and found out. We went in and verified, so now we can analyze stuff. See how that works? Saddam didn't conform to U.N. Resolutions regarding his known WMDs, period.

So why would North Korea disarm, knowing that shrub would invade anyway? The message shrub has sent is "if you have nuclear or other powerfull weapons, better keep them and use them if attacked, otherwise you're toast"

Will someone please tell this to Khadafy in Libya? Oops, too late!”

“Oh, for the record, my statement above was NOT meant to be the final "word" on this issue. Thank you for your support. You may now be seated.”

“Some might say Gadhafi instead of Khadafy. I hope this is the final word.”

“For the record, Violin and I are in the same camp on this one, and oh, this just in, Hell has frozen over.”

“Hey, come on now, Stickman, we've moved on from Al Franken to Moammar Gadhafi! It was a natural transition.”

“Lol, what would a thread be if it didn't wander off topic?”

“Sorry if I assumed you called me a Dem, Stick. I coudn't help it from your "Seems to me conservatives like Buck and liberals like Laqtis are blowing this out of proportion....." comment that that's what you were laying down.

I agree that this horse isn't kickin' anymore. It's apparent that there are no charges, it was no issue. Let's move on.”

“What ever happened to Davis?”

“Right! Now ha, ha,
Q is an antichrist
Q is an anarchist
Don't know what he wants
But he knows how to get it
Q wants to destroy the passerby

'Cause Q wanna be Anarchy
No dogs body

Anarchy for the USA
It's coming sometime and maybe
Q will give a wrong time stop a traffic line
Your future dream is a shopping scheme

'Cause Q wanna be Anarchy
In the city

How many ways to get what you want
Q uses the best
Q uses the rest
Q uses the enemy
Q uses Anarchy

'Cause Q wanna be Anarchy
It's the only way to be

Is this the M.P.L.A or
Is this the U.D.A or
Is this the I.R.A
I thought it was the UK
Or just another country
Another council tenancy

Q Wants to be Anarchy
Q Wants to be Anarchy
Oh what a name

Q wanna be Anarchy
Know what he means?

And Q wanna be an anarchist
Get pissed
Destroy!”

“Doesn't everyone want to be an anarchist? There are a lot of wannabe anarchists on the internet.”

“"Borin' Sidney...borin'."”

“I like that tune. It's got a nice ring to it!”

“Wow!!! Just looked at how much the Union Leader's coverage differed from the Fox-owned New York Post version.

http://www.theunionleader.com/articles_showa.html?article=32449

How can the conservative Union Leader (they endorsed Bush in 2000) be so fair and balanced in their coverage? Oh that's right, they're not owned by Fox, so fair and balanced reporting is still possible (though illegal according to Fox's lawyers since they think they own the phrase "fair and balanced").”

“I'm still LMAO about "The O'Franken Factor"”

“I am no Franken fan, but those LaRouche people are weird and always have been. They have been around for decades and you can't label them (e.g. neo-con). A couple of times I talked with them outside of stores...bizarre. They were on campus two weeks ago with a booth in a high traffic area (common to have political or religious groups do that).”

“I know what you mean Phil. The had a table set up outside a motor vehicle agency a few years back and I stopped for a few minutes. Definitely had a cult-like aura.”

“What weight class did Franken wrestle? I think I could take him.”

“Violin - I does seem cultish. Once I was talking to a guy and when he realized I knew something he knew exactly what to say to attempt to get my goat. He was very surgical.”

“Lord how I miss William F. Buckley.

In a cage match, he would have beaten the tar out of Franken.”

“From yesterday's NY Post:

February 2, 2004 -- I did not body-slam a protestor at a Dean rally in Manchester as Vincent Morris wrote ("Al Franken Knocks Down Dean Heckler," Jan. 27).
Mr. Morris made no attempt to reach me before publishing his story.

His description, "Franken emerged from the crowd and charged one male protester, grabbing him with a bear hug from behind and slamming him onto the floor," is a complete fairy tale.

Only after the protestor had shoved and elbowed security guards and started to charge the podium did I help stop the man by grabbing his legs and lifting them off the floor. The man did not hit the ground, because others were holding his upper body. He was then removed by the security guards without being hurt.

I think you have an obligation to set the record straight by publishing this letter in its entirety.
Al Franken
Manhattan


* * *



Editor's note: Mr. Morris witnessed the altercation from beginning to end and made no attempt to "reach [Franken] before publishing his story" because it was based in part on the following taped interview Morris conducted with Franken at the Palace Theater in Manchester, N.H., moments after the incident ended:

Q: Why did you decide to throw him out?

A: "I wanted to get him out . . ."

Q: How did you get him down, how did you get him out?

A: "I took his legs out. Yeah!"

Q: So you grabbed his legs, you tackled his legs?

A: "Yeah! I just got down there, and took his legs out."

Q: Once he was on the ground, were you holding him down?

A: "Ahhhh, yeah! He was in the air, he was actually in the air! Ha, ha, ha, ha! That was the point. If he has no contact with the ground, it's hard for him to stay. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!"

Q: So you take his legs out?

A: "Yeah! You take his legs out."

Q: Like a football tackle?

A: "Yeah! Like a wrestling move!"

Q: You a wrestler?

A: I was a wrestler.

Q: Are you a Dean supporter?

A: "No. I'm neutral. But I'm for freedom of speech, which means that people should be allowed to assemble and speak without being shouted down."

Q: So you wouldn't have done it if he didn't keep shouting?

A: "I would have done it if he was a Dean supporter at a Kerry rally."

Q: So anybody else that was making noise?

A: "I would have done it if he was a Kerry supporter. I would have done it if he was a Franken supporter! Ha, ha, ha, ha! I mean I would have done it!"

Q: Did you get hurt other than your glasses?

A: "I didn't get hurt. My glasses got knocked off. I wasn't hurt at all. I should have just taken my glasses off before I did it."




From talking points memo:

This was actually a coordinated LaRouchie attack, with shouts, escalating into heckles and then blowing right through to blizzards of four-letter-words. It also seemed to show up some weaknesses in the Dean security detail. We were up on the theater's upper level and had one of the hecklers come down to the ledge, arms looping this way and that, screaming about Cheney, screaming at Dean, mostly just screaming.

He was the second string protestor or rather the second wave, after the first guy got tossed. Security at these sorts of events tends to be a 'C'mon, c'mon, you've really got to leave now' sort of affair. But as he was working up into full-froth a crew-cut three-hundred-poundish all-together not nice looking guy stomped out, extended his arm, grabbed the dude by the scruff of his neck, said a couple unpleasant things, and then proceeded to shake the guy around like a friggin' rag doll, all the while making clear that he really shouldn't have made such a scene.

Kenny and I looked at each other, thinking, "Sheesh, they're literally going to throw that guy out into the street." But a few moments later, as I'm watching Dean, scribbling in my notebook and comtemplating the fate of the LaRouchie in the hands of Dean's Rock'em, Sock'em Robot, suddenly I hear ... "Aga b'dada, yada! yada, Cheney Cheney #$%#@&, Dean Cheney, Beast Man! allooooooo, yiiiiiiigraaaaaahhhhh. Yada! Dean, who the $#@% do you think you ..."

He was back.

How did he get back in?

No idea.”

“The Larouche folks are scary. As a kid (in high school) I was a Trotskyite (before becoming, an anarchist, a libertarian, a Eisenhower Republican and whatever odd mess of evolving opinions I have had since turning 21) and met some of his folks.

Larouche, originally named Lynn Marcus, grew up near me, was a Quaker and had been associated with Trokskyite groups. Some of the Trots I knew in Boston knew him pretty well. Most people who had known him suspected that he was an infiltrator working for someone else. He founded a group called the National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) which had at one time been a faction of the radical student group SDS (from which other groups like the Weathermen emerged).

Around 1973, Larouche's group (NCLC) started organizing armed groups to physically attack other left wing groups, especially the American Communist Party and the Socialist Workers Party. At the time, they claimed to be the true left and said they were attacking "sell-out" groups. They came into meetings and tried to shout down speakers, later they came to meetings with Hockey sticks and baseball bats. At 16, I actually spent a few evenings with baseball bat in hand outside of political meetings of groups that had been threatened by NCLC.

Some members of NCLC tried to recruit me back in 1973. I had lunch in Harvard Square with tow of them out of curiosity (funny they were that interested in a kid). They were pretty funny, but scary - they showed real contempt for the very people they were trying to organize and liberate: students and working people. Already they were paranoid about Queen Elizabeth, jewish bankers and some drug cartel that British Royalists were running in order to ruin American democracy (if it had made any sense to me, I might have rememered the ideas better).

Here is an interesting history of Larouche, which includes evidence of his becoming paranoid and misogynistic in 1973 after his wife left him for another NCLC member (I never heard about this until reading the website today):

http://www.publiceye.org/larouche/nclc1.html”

“In the indomitable spirit of LaRouche, I hereby challenge Franken to a wrestling match to determine the "real" liberal wrestler. If I don't hear from him in the next two days, the title will be mine, defacto.”

“Dam, Stovie , you're not telling us he's as bad as the other Al that's melting the polar caps?”

“The IRS needs to audit the crook.”

“I don't have any sympathy for any hypocrit.

Doesn't matter if it's Franken or Limbaugh.
last edited: 5/09/08 10:26:05 AM”

“They sould hire a Snipeser to get rid of him.”

“This is why Democrats are so fond of lower taxes. They don't have to pay them.”