Forgive me if I can't get too excited about Al Franken's political plans. Every newsroom in town Thursday was salivating over the possibility that the comedian-turned-left-wing-radio-talker might actually announce he would run for the U.S. Senate seat being given up by Mark Dayton. I wish I could say it was different at MPR, but it wasn't.

WCCO radio even had Franken on their air to tell their listeners that he wouldn't say yes or no until his own show started on another station. That kind of agressively embarassing self-promotion (aided and abetted by an all too willing "news" media) hasn't been seen since Jesse Ventura was still bald.

Of course you could probably logically conclude that if someone was going to announce a run for a senate seat he might want to do it in the state he was actually trying to represent. Alert journalists probably should have picked up on that. Instead we sat through three hours of Franken's program waiting for him to make the big non-announcement. And the newspapers and at least one TV station actually led with it. We put it on the air too.

Franken says he still may run against Norm Coleman in '08. Let's hope for his sake that Fox News still employs Bill O'Reilly by then, because his main gimmick seems to be poking O'Reilly with a stick. Hard to believe Katherine Lanpher left MPR for this.

This being Friday I wanted to include a few e-mail comments I've received on Gov. Pawlenty's budget. Here's one from George Seldes:

The governor's budget takes the exact wrong direction on funding democracy. We need 100 percent publically-funded elections. We must extract money from our political processes. It starts with elections and continues throughout the legislative process.

While reporting has improved in recent years for monied interests that influence
our democracy; it's still put into broad categories and it's all manual.
Where's the online reporting of lobbyists and corporations? Yes some exists,
but not usable data, only lists that are difficult to contextualize.

It's frustrating to see all this reporting, but it misses the context of how
policies are proposed and decisions are made. But thanks for your reporting,
it's the one dim light in the darkness. It doesn't take much light when it's as
dark as our process is today.

Patrick Thibault wrote this on health care:

I don't see why legislators can't fix the health care problem. It really is a simpe matter of correcting the risk-averaging method that has gone awry.

For example, if we, collectively, as a community decided that we could cover all
citizens, we could do so at only a slight increase in cost to each one of us.

Rather, what has happened, is that health care providers and insurance providers
have "tilted" the playing field over time, so that persons with higher acuity,
in terms of illness, receive less coverage and are placed on the back of
government.

This is just a feeder system by the private sector to reduce the "high risk"
clients in their coverage and put the burden on the public sector.

I don't blame the insurance companies; they're in the business of making a
profit. But, in this case, their business practices, along with the health care
industry, are leading to an unhealthy system.

Heather Martinson wrote this about the "welfare healthcare" debate:

I agree that the Minnesota Care Health Plan is an excellent program. My problem with the welfare system has always been the people who get on assistance and stay on it for years; the people who are capable of working and just do not want to!

I personally know several women who are single parents and just keep
having kids so they can stay on welfare. They think it is easier to get
assistance than to get an education and work.

I was a single mother of two children (one has bipolar and was not diagnosed properly for several years) and I never have received assistance of any kind. I sometimes did not eat so my kids could, had holes in my undergarments so my kids had new clothes, walked to work because I had no money for gas or car insurance, etc.

Now I am remarried to a wonderful man and we give to the food shelf, pick names off the "angel tree" at Christmas time, pay for other children to participate in school activites, etc. All this is done anoymously. My children know now how hard we had it before I was remarried but they never knew then.

I would really like to see the governor revamp the welfare program to force people to get an education so they can work rather than just cutting them off. We need some sort of assistance to those who are unable to work due to illness, or those who are working and just need a little help to survive.

Keep the comments coming and have a good weekend.