The Patriot Post® · Al Franken's Resignation

I was going to say a few words on Trump and Jerusalem, but then I tuned in to the Al Franken resignation speech. Is anyone else as confused as I am?

I have a couple of explanations for what he did, but consider the landscape. Essentially, he claimed he didn’t do anything wrong. The allegations he didn’t deny outright were phrased as his “remembering events differently” from his accusers. Give his speechwriter a raise for such a creative way to call the women liars. He said he was shocked that anyone would interpret his actions as offensive but apologized if anyone did — another non-apology apology that underscored his belief that he had done nothing wrong.

And even if there were some jump balls in how women had reacted to his actions, they all occurred (save one that he outright denied) before he was in the Senate. He emphasized that he had never done anything as a senator to bring dishonor on the institution. Now, that may not be surprising since before the good liberals of Minnesota validated his progressive bona fides by electing him to office, he was an obscure comedian and movie actor — his Oscar-worthy performance as an Amtrak baggage handler in the film “Trading Places” notwithstanding.

True, his poll numbers in his home state had plummeted, but he was not up for re-election for a while and there had been no groundswell of constituent fervor for him to exit stage left. And given what seemed like his genuine belief that he had done nothing wrong and the prospect of the pendulum swinging back after the sexual harassment uproar faded, riding out the storm and pledging to continue to work for women’s issues seemed like a reasonable expectation — at least as plausible as his resigning. After all, the poster child for workplace sexual harassment had gone from impeached president to the most popular Democrat on the planet in 10 short years; redemption was certainly a distinct possibility.

So, why did he quit? There are some clues in the speech, but the basic reason can be summed up by that old political truism — politics ain’t beanbag — and the Democrats in the Senate forced him out. The bottom line is that he became expendable in the Democrat rush to score political points from the sexual harassment environment. It was pure power politics brought to you by the amazingly disciplined and unified Democrat Party. Franken used part of his speech to trash Trump and Moore — part of the negotiated deal I think. He did the Democrat Party’s bidding by adding fuel to the Trump impeachment fire and set up a potentially distracting and embarrassing scenario for the GOP, assuming Moore wins. Since Moore will never bow to the same pressures that the Democrats put on Franken, it will provide no end of Democrat talking points. The GOP either is in the awkward position of supporting him or the equally bad drip-drip position of answering constant questions as the ethics committee does its work. His constituents, family and friends didn’t push Franken out; the Democrats needed him to go to support their GOP narrative, so they obviously threatened him with the loss of party support. Game, set, match.

His speech also hinted at other elements of the deal. He will stay until year’s end (as opposed to leaving now), which will give the ethics committee time to complete its review — and don’t be shocked if it concludes that what he did was not relevant since it occurred before he took office. That will allow Franken to be quasi-cleared and present himself as a good soldier for resigning for the good of the party, not because of any impropriety. He was allowed to make the resignation speech on the Senate floor as opposed to phoning it in via press release. This is unusual and serves to again set him apart from others who are being run out of Dodge for transgressions they admit to. All is designed to give him a somewhat soft landing while slowly pulling the knife out of his back. In a way (and I never thought I would say this), I feel a bit sorry for him.

And it was probably sold to him with a classic carrot/stick — if you play ball, we will not universally trash you and destroy your life, which will give you at least a shot at redemption; if you fight us, you have no idea what is headed your way. Guys like Franken want to believe that the public will forgive and forget, so he probably concluded that living to fight another day was the best course.

Don’t get me wrong, I think Franken was a joke as a senator, regardless of his prior high standing with the Democrat far-left, and see his personal behavior as boorish and appalling. But he was railroaded out by a ruthless Democrat Party that considered nothing but potential political gain for it. The impact on Franken was not even on its radar screen. The only open question is the over/under timing on when the Franken issue resurfaces as a centerpiece of the Trump impeachment efforts. No one will take the same bet on Moore; that trashing will begin as soon as the Alabama race is called.