A FAIR AND BALANCED REVIEW OF THE FRANKEN BOOK: Looking for a book to read for the four-hour train ride back from Boston last weekend, I stopped into the book store at Boston's South Station and settled on "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them," the somewhat controversial new political humor book by Al Franken. After finishing the first half in one sitting and the rest a few days later, I can say that while I've got quite a few objections, I'm glad I read it.
I've got a bit of a mixed relationship to Franken and his work. He's from where I'm from (St. Louis Park, MN), I once met him at a Twins game and found him to be quite a friendly guy, I've enjoyed a great deal of the stuff he wrote and performed on "Saturday Night Live," and absolutely loved his 1996 book "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot."
But on the other hand, my politics have moved rightward as his have lurched leftward, and it's hard to dispute that Franken's humor these days has a mere fraction of the bite his '70s SNL stuff did- much of which certainly has to do with his split with longtime writing partner Tom Davis. And I also find his tactic of rebutting the "shrill and mean-spirited" tactics of conservatives by being shrill and mean-spirited himself a tad hypocritical. But at any rate, I was sympathetic to Franken during Bill O'Reilly's hysterical lawsuit against him (writing about it here), and so I figured I'd give his book a shot.
The book starts out with all the easy, deserving targets (O'Reilly, Coulter, Bernard Goldberg, Fox News), winning most of the battles decisively and gleefully tearing their arguments to shreds. On the more difficult stuff, however, Franken punts- he devotes short, unconvincing chapters to the Iraq war and the 2000 election, and has just about nothing to say about either the Democratic presidential field or the current crisis in the Democratic party over the role of liberalism in the War on Terror. Franken's "issue" chapters, as a rule, don’t ring nearly as true as his shots at various celebrity pundits.
In addition, his chapter on the infamous Paul Wellstone memorial service, while honorable in exposing some of the excesses of the right-wing reaction, leaves out a few major details as well, including Iowa Senator Tom Harkin leading the crowd in a chant of "We Will Win!"
Franken also borrows a trick from his enemies on the right by misdefining everything- mistakes in speech, flip-flops, jokes, or deniability-maintaining spin- as "lies." It's dishonest, and only serves to make Franken look hypocritical. Especially since he stretches the truth quite a bit himself, in using every one of those tactics.
In addition, the author includes a laugh-free sequel to the Limbaugh book's most tedious chapter, "Operation Chickenhawk," as well as a generally unfunny cartoon about "Supply Side Jesus." For every joke that kills about 6 or 7 fall flat; Franken also borrows from Peter Vecsey the awful-writer tic of writing long paragraphs that start out factual-sounding but end with lame joke punchlines. Which is the book's biggest weakness- Franken shifts between joking and complete seriousness more or less at will.
There are some highlights, however, such as a faux visit by Franken and his "son" to Bob Jones University, the author's challenge of masculinity-espousing conservative pundit Rich Lowry to a fight, and the entire chapter devoted to exposing the fraud that is "Hannity & Colmes." The author even puts Colmes' name in a smaller typeface, and jokes that his autobiography should've been called "Back to You Sean: The Alan Colmes Story."
If you can get past the absurdity of a book-length polemic arguing that liberalism is always right, Franken's book is all right. "Lies and the Lying Liars" is hardly for hardcore lefties only, which is what separates it, say, from the latest Michael Moore screed. If you're looking for an easy read with a few laughs about the last few years of American politics, it's for you, providing you're willing to take everything with a grain of salt. If what you want is serious, academic analysis of why "Bush is a moron, na na na na na!"; I direct you instead to Paul Krugman.
A FOOTNOTE: I discovered at the end of the book that among Franken's team of researchers was Steve Rabin, a classmate of mine at Brandeis and one of my roommates senior year (us, and Donald Fehr's son). Steve, now at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, wrote his senior thesis as a refutation of the "liberal media bias" theory, thus beating both Franken and Eric Alterman to the topic by almost four years.
Posted by Stephen Silver at November 25, 2003 05:06 PM