Coleman vs. Franken: Bowlers and Talking Fish

In the most recent Minneapolis Star Tribune Minnesota Poll, the U.S. Senate race just got more interesting. Republican incumbent Norm Coleman still leads his Democratic challenger Al Franken 41 percent to 37 percent, but the margin is much smaller than it used to be.

One reason why might be Dean Barkley of the Independence Party (also known as the Jesse Ventura Party), who has been taking away votes from the other two candidates. The former Senator (yes, he was. You can look it up.) is in third place with 13 percent. The other reason might be that Coleman and Franken aren't endearing themselves to voters, and Barkley is seen more as a protest vote.

Since the local TV stations would rather cover the latest murder in North Minneapolis than the Senate race, most people's awareness of the campaign is limited to the barrage of advertising that's been flooding the airwaves. As you might expect, most of them have been of the finger-pointing variety.

If you watch enough of the Norm Coleman ads that were produced by outside supporters, you might get the impression that Franken is an angry guy who wants to raise taxes while not paying any of his own, cut Social Security and Medicare for senior citizens, and eliminate the secret ballot for union elections (For those of us who don't belong to unions, we've heard several explanations of why this is important. But we still don't get it. Maybe they're making something out of nothing?).

Franken's ads play up the claim that Coleman and President Bush are joined at the hip when it comes to his Senate voting record, even going so far as to show pictures of them embracing. They also employ a talking fish--You know, the one that hangs on your wall and sings "Don't Worry, Be Happy"?--to highlight Coleman's taking trips that may have been paid for by special interests. It's nice to know that Franken, the former Saturday Night Live performer who turned into a dead-serious politician, still has a sense of humor.

Coleman counters with his own ads insisting that his being buddy-buddy with Bush was just a fabrication, producing evidence that the photos the other party uses were retouched. Oh, and those guys from the bowling alley are back, suggesting that if Coleman could bring Vikings and Packers fans together, then certainly he could bring peace to Congress and the Middle East. And, don't forget, Coleman brought hockey back.

It'd be nice if these guys would come out and actually tell us what they would do if they were elected to the Senate. But we've watched enough campaigns to know that the last place you'd want to do that is in a TV commercial. November can't come soon enough.