Franken Quotes & Sayings

When the Soviet Union launched Sputnik in 1957, my parents, like the rest of America, were terrified. The Soviets had nuclear weapons and now were ahead of us in space. So my parents marched me and Owen into our living room, sat us down, and said, " You boys are going to study math and Science so we can beat the Soviets!"
I thought that was a lot of pressure to put on a six-year old. But own and I were obedient sons, so we studied math and science. And we were good at it.. Owen was the first in our family to go to college. He went to MIT, graduating with a degree in physics, and then became a photographer.
I went to Harvard, and became a comedian. My poor parents.
But we still beat the Soviets. You're welcome. — Al Franken

Was Philip Dexter upset?"
"He's telephoned the office every day."
She was pleased about that. "Who else was upset?"
"Everybody. Roosevelt orderded an hour of silence while you were on the table. Like Armistice Day. — Rose Franken

As Al Franken has demonstrated, liberals give lousy talk radio. — L. Neil Smith

Check your vagina. Does it look kind of broken? If so, you probably had a baby. Seriously, mine was all Franken-gina for a good year before it was presentable again. — Jenny Lawson

To make the argument that the media has a left- or right-wing, or a liberal or a conservative bias, is like asking if the problem with Al-Qaeda is do they use too much oil in their hummus. — Al Franken

I got interested in politics during the civil rights movement and then Vietnam. — Al Franken

Call-time has renewed my faith in the need for public financing of elections. 'Call-time' is where I as the candidate, sit in a room with my 'call-time manager,' and a phone. Then I call people and ask them for money. For hours. Apparently, I'm really good at it. — Al Franken

When you live in New York, one of two things happen - you either become a New Yorker, or you feel more like the place you came from. — Al Franken

I hope you realize, in a democracy, laughter is assent. — Al Franken

I want to reclaim 'liberal.' I'm a liberal, and I think most Americans are liberals. — Al Franken

When you encounter seemingly good advice that contradicts other seemingly good advice, ignore them both. — Al Franken

Teen pregnancy went way down in the '90s, and 75 percent of it was because of increased use of contraception. — Al Franken

Demagoguery sells. And therefore radio stations will put it on. But that doesn't mean that you can't do something else and also make it sell. You know, when I look at an Ann Coulter or I look at a Rush or I look at a Sean Hannity, I think to myself, 'What kind of self-image do you have?' — Al Franken

I'm for Israel's right to exist. — Al Franken

Let's keep the Internet weird. Let's keep the Internet free. — Al Franken

We owe an historic debt to American Indians. They have a unique set of concerns that haven't been addressed, and I'd like to stand with them. Also, I'd like to get their views on immigration. — Al Franken

The reason I wrote political satire was because I thought it - politics - was important ... that public policy was important. Then I transitioned into books, then into radio. — Al Franken

Some of George W. Bush's friends say that Bush believes God called him to be president during these times of trial. But God told me that He/She/It had actually chosen Al Gore by making sure that Gore won the popular vote and, God thought, the Electoral College. 'That worked for everyone else,' God said. — Al Franken

Liberals don't hate America. We love America more than Ann Coulter does. I love it enough to engage my readers honestly. — Al Franken

WHAT DO WE WANT?! PATIENCE! WHEN DO WE WANT IT?! NOW! — Al Franken

Progressives, in a way, are the new conservatives. We want to conserve what we fought to build. — Al Franken

I felt like the luckiest kid in the world. And I was. I was growing up middle-class in a time when growing up middle-class in America meant there would be jobs for my parents, good schools for me to prepare myself for a career, and, if I worked hard and played by the rules, a chance for me to do anything I wanted. — Al Franken

I do personal attacks only on people who specialize in personal attacks. — Al Franken

The crash of 2008 was driven in no small part by unfair practices in the mortgage industry, which led to many consumers becoming trapped in loans they didn't understand and couldn't afford. — Al Franken

Yeah, but you need an experienced radio veteran who is a liberal advocate. And there just hadn't been any radio that did that. And so they weren't trained - they had developed all these bad habits of being objective and balanced and stuff like that. — Al Franken

You can't change your fingerprints. You have only ten of them. And you leave them on everything you touch; they are definitely not a secret. — Al Franken

I couldn't think of anything less appealing than molding the minds of tomorrow's leaders. — Al Franken

Gary Bauer is a very good - he's a good friend of mine. — Al Franken

Google's screen for privacy settings does give you more options for what you share than Apple's does. But it's not a complete list, and people aren't aware of whether or not that information will go to a third party. — Al Franken

Minnesotans know the difference between the job of satirist and the job of senator. And so do I. — Al Franken

Anybody who deliberately propagandizes with lies should be held up to scorn and ridicule. — Al Franken

My dad loved comedians, especially George Jessel, and he loved Henny Youngman and Buddy Hackett. — Al Franken

Minnesotans lost their jobs because the credit rating agencies didn't do the only job they're supposed to have, the only job they had, which is to give accurate, objective ratings to financial products. — Al Franken

[Bush Hating] undermines the good faith necessary for democratic discussion. Which is a large part of what people like Al Franken are all about. — Andrew Sullivan

Well, I think that there's a value to comedy in and of itself. — Al Franken

Mistakes are a part of being human. Precious life lessons that can only be learned the hard way. Unless it's a fatal mistake, which, at least, others can learn from. — Al Franken

There are as many forms of advice as there are colors of the rainbow. Remember that good advice can come from bad people and bad advice from good people. The important thing about advice is that it is simply that. Advice. — Al Franken

Terrorism, to me, is the use of terror for political purpose, and terror is indiscriminate murder of civilians to make a political point. — Al Franken

I do have a self-censor; everybody does, or at least most who are not pathological do. — Al Franken

My views about God come from my dad. Dad told me that he believed Nature, which to him included humankind, to be so beautiful, so magnificent, that there had to be something behind it all. — Al Franken

The government must give proper weight to both keeping America safe from terrorists and protecting Americans' privacy. But when Americans lack the most basic information about our domestic surveillance programs, they have no way of knowing whether we're getting that balance right. This lack of transparency is a big problem. — Al Franken

You have to love your country like an adult loves somebody, not like a child loves its mommy. And right-wing Republicans tend to love America like a child loves its mommy, where everything Mommy does is okay. But adult love means you're not in denial, and you want the loved one to be the best they can be. — Al Franken

Comedy to the Senate? Well, there certainly hasn't been a satirist or a political satirist who's done that. So, that really was uncharted territory during the campaign. But I think it's a good thing. Some people thought that it was an odd career arc, but to me it made absolute sense. — Al Franken

For 35 years, I was a writer. I wrote a lot of jokes. Some of them weren't funny. Some of them weren't appropriate. Some of them were downright offensive. I understand that. — Al Franken

When the Constitution was written, the founders had no way of anticipating the new technologies that would evolve in the coming centuries. — Al Franken

I'm crushed by the responsibility of writing a satirical book. — Al Franken

Net neutrality has been in place since the very beginning of the Internet. — Al Franken

I just can't sit still and meditate; that doesn't kind of work for me. I don't even know exactly what it means. — Al Franken

When I first started writing for television in the seventies and eighties, the Internet didn't exist, and we didn't need to worry about foreign websites illegally distributing the latest TV shows and blockbuster movies online. — Al Franken

I think Clinton fatigue was a real thing. It's just hard to get comfortable with Gore - it was hard for him to project who he is, the person people know in private. — Al Franken

My parents were really political. The news was very important in our home. We basically had dinner every night while watching the news, and then we'd discuss it with our parents. — Al Franken

As a source of innovation, an engine of our economy, and a forum for our political discourse, the Internet can only work if it's a truly level playing field. Small businesses should have the same ability to reach customers as powerful corporations. A blogger should have the same ability to find an audience as a media conglomerate. — Al Franken

If someone hacks your password, you can change it - as many times as you want. — Al Franken

It's hard for a liberal to go on between Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, because it's like doing country music after hip-hop. I mean, just, the audience doesn't go from one to the other. — Al Franken

I think the Internet has developed at this incredibly rapid pace because of net neutrality, because of the free nature of it, because a YouTube can start the way YouTube started. — Al Franken

What you see on the campaign trail is me. It's easy being me. — Al Franken

One thing I've noticed about politics is that these guys have pretty thick hides. — Al Franken

To ask whether the mainstream media has a conservative or liberal bias is like asking whether al-Qaida uses too much oil in their hummus. It's - I think they might use too much oil in their hummus - but it's the wrong question. — Al Franken

Net neutrality isn't a government takeover of the Internet, as many of my Republican colleagues have alleged. — Al Franken

I don't know how many of you have been to New York, but if a building is two blocks away from anything, you can't see it. — Al Franken

Sometimes if I tell people, 'I'm afraid that I'm really a fraud,' or 'I have a lot of self-doubt,' they go, 'Oh, no, you're kidding.' I go, 'No, I'm really honest.' — Al Franken

My dad never graduated high school. He was a printing salesman. We lived in a two-bedroom, one-bath house in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. We weren't rich - but we felt secure. — Al Franken

We need to start by having a conversation about climate change. It would be irresponsible to avoid the issue just because it's uncomfortable to talk about. — Al Franken

Some of my colleagues seem more interested in using every procedural method possible to keep the Senate from doing anything than they are in creating jobs or helping Americans struggling in a difficult economy. — Al Franken

Yeah, we shot ourselves in the foot right out of the gate. The guy who ran it at first misled pretty much everybody about how much capital we had. He said we had enough to go three years without making money, and we had enough to go three weeks. — Al Franken

You might not like that Facebook shares your political opinions with Politico, but are you really going to delete all the photos, all the posts, all the connections - the presence you've spent years establishing on the world's dominant social network? — Al Franken

I ask the American people not to fall victim to disinformation. There are no death panels. The Affordable Care Act cuts the deficit. — Al Franken

I am a Minnesotan, and not just because I root for the Vikings and the Twins. I like the Minnesota-nice sensibility. I like the liberal tradition; I like the Hubert Humphrey tradition fighting for civil rights. — Al Franken

Bob Dole used to be really funny. Barney Frank can be kind of funny. Bob Kerrey has a good sense of humor. — Al Franken

I know I have an awful lot to learn from the people of Minnesota. — Al Franken

Armed with nothing more than a Facebook user's phone number and home address, anyone with an Internet connection and a few dollars can obtain personal information they should never have access to, including a user's date of birth, e-mail address, or estimated income. — Al Franken

Service dogs raise their masters' sense of well-being. — Al Franken

My dad didn't graduate from high school, ended up being a printing salesman, probably never made more than $8,000 a year. My mom sold real estate and did it part time. — Al Franken

I've had a lot of operations. I'm kind of like Franken-actor. — Sylvester Stallone

When the president during the campaign
said he was against nation building,
I didn't realize he meant our nation. — Al Franken

I think that the default for collecting any kind of personal data should be opt-in consent. — Al Franken

It's really building Air America that I'm focused on, and for me, that almost only means doing a good show. — Al Franken

There's plenty of room for humor in politics, God knows, but it's a serious business. — Al Franken

The civil rights movement was very important in my house, and then Vietnam was very important 'cause there were two boys, so I came of age during a very heated political climate. — Al Franken

Today I will masterbate!
Okay, that was a mistake. I should have written Today I will masterbate
if I want to! — Al Franken

I had a great time working on the movies, both the major movies I've done. I've had a great time. I like the people in Hollywood a lot. — Al Franken

There is - I mean - I found early in life that righteous indignation is a little off-putting, and so I try to couch it with humor. — Al Franken

He [Newt Gingrich] is the most unpopular politician in America. His favorable rating is only four points higher than the Unabomber. — Al Franken

National security laws must protect national security. But they must also protect the public trust and preserve the ability of an informed electorate to hold its government to account. — Al Franken

Most Americans don't think about antitrust law when they look at their cable bill, flip channels on TV, or worry about what their favorite website knows about them. But they should. — Al Franken

I'm from the Vietnam generation. I didn't serve. — Al Franken

At 'SNL,' I wrote political stuff, but I never felt the show should have an axe to grind. But when I left in '95, I could let my own beliefs out. — Al Franken

Antitrust law isn't about protecting competing businesses from each other, it's about protecting competition itself on behalf of the public. — Al Franken

The point is that there is tremendous hypocrisy among the Christian right. And I think that Christian voters should start looking at global warming and extreme poverty as a religious issue that speaks to the culture of life. — Al Franken

Well, a lot of politics is communicating with people, and obviously comedy has something to do with that. I've been a producer and led people. Also, being a comedian, you're under pressure. — Al Franken

There's no comparison between NPR and the propaganda that you hear from Rush or from Sean Hannity, the news movement conservatives that are just laying out, slathering out the disinformation and the lies, as I discuss in my book, 'Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right.' — Al Franken

Yo mama so ugly even Hello Kitty said good bye. — Jess Franken

It's the Power of the Almighty, the Splendor of Nature, and then you. — Al Franken

Anyone can be passionate but it takes real lovers to be silly. — Rose Franken

Let's not let the government sell us out. Let's fight for net neutrality. — Al Franken

Having an actual income can expand your romantic horizons toward the more appealing end of the spectrum. — Al Franken

If you use Facebook - as I do - Facebook in all likelihood has a unique digital file of your face, one that can be as accurate as a fingerprint and that can be used to identify you in a photo of a large crowd. — Al Franken

We need to be pro-science; we have to go back to science. — Al Franken

If you cross Fox News Channel, it's not just me, it's Roger Ailes who will go after youThe person gets what's coming to them but never sees it coming. Look at Al Franken, one day he's going to get a knock on his door and life as he's known it will change forever. That day will happen, trust me. — Bill O'Reilly

I think if you're going to do a movie about Reagan, you do it about the fact that he created the huge deficit, that he armed the Mujahideen, that he armed Saddam, that he armed Iran, that he armed two-thirds of the Axis of Evil, and that he funded terrorists in Central America. He was, in my mind, a terrible president. — Al Franken