The Case of Al Franken by Jane Mayer

[DFW]

22. The story is long, but well worth reading

The Senate Democrats didn't just shoot themselves in the foot. They blew it off with a hand grenade. Schumer, it turns out, was even more of a weasel than I recalled at the time, and that is saying something. I also hadn't heard the regrets of Bill Nelson, whom I know slightly, but haven't seen for two years, or Heidi Heitkamp, whom I was supposed to have met, but fell ill half an hour before and was rushed by ambulance from Claire McCaskill's Senate office to GW Hospital with a suspected heart attack (it turned out to be the flu).

That the whole publicity campaign was organized by Republican sleaze I DID know, though more names are mentioned here than I had ever heard of. The continued repetition of the Fox personalities' version of the events by some here on DU (who seemingly show to post ONLY about this subject) is cause for pause. Just who is pushing whose agenda here?

Al made some errors in judgment in how he handled the whole thing, but there was no handbook to go by. Schumer et al handled it by the Napoleonic code (the accused is guilty until proven innocent), and Al Franken had served in a Senate supposedly dedicated to preserving a code of laws that saw it the other way around.

All in all, the article gave plenty of text space to all non-anonymous accusers that wanted to have their say. Norm Ornstein knows Al better than anyone else interviewed, and because of that I can understand why more of his comments were not included, though Norm is probably the most eloquent speaker/writer of the lot.

It confirms my decision not to contribute to, or support the presidential nomination of, ANY Democratic Senator who publicly called for Al's resignation. These are not people I want negotiating on my country's behalf with the leaders of China, Russia, the EU or Mitch McConnell. If they are THIS easily manipulated, they have no business in the Oval Office.