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Politics

8398 – Is the “Al Frankin Decade” upon us?

AL FRANKEN FOR SENATOR
Al Franken, the “Saturday Night Live” alum and Bill O’Reilly nemesis, is inching closer to a run for the U.S. Senate in 2008.
Franken, who has a daily radio show on the liberal Air America network, was based in New York until a last month, when he quietly picked up and moved his residence and his show to Minneapolis.
The comedian says he’s still undecided about challenging Republican Sen. Norm Coleman √≥ but it appears that his reluctance is only a matter of convenience.
Once he announces his bid for office, he will have to give up his three-hour, daily radio show. Radio and TV stations are reluctant to carry programs hosted by political candidates since it opens them to charges of favoritism.
“I think I’m going to let it evolve,” he told an Internet interviewer, alternet.org, a few days ago.
“I don’t have to decide for a while, and I’m sort of doing the things that I’d have to do if I did run.
“So if I do make the decision to do it, I’ll have done the things I needed to have done,” he says.
“I’m learning √≥ traveling within Minnesota, talking to people. I’ve been raising money for candidates in Minnesota and around the country.”
Franken has already raised $168,000 in just over two months, according to a campaign-finance report. So far, he has given the money to six other liberal candidates ó a classic strategy for politicians trying to build up a position for themselves within the party.