JUST IN: Women staff of "Saturday Night Live" sign letter in support of Sen. Al Franken

[octoberlib]

Link to tweet

JUST IN: Women staff of "Saturday Night Live" sign letter in support of Sen. Al Franken

[smirkymonkey]

1. I'm glad they sent this. It would be interesting to see the names though.

Just out of curiosity.

[octoberlib]

4. Here's the names

:large

[yardwork]

5. Jane Curtin signed it. That says a lot to me.

I worked with Jane many years ago. She has a lot of credibility in my eyes.

[Orrex]

22. Jane Curtain kicks ass

Also, here's the classic send-up of punditry that remains sadly relevant four decades later:

[dflprincess]

40. Didn't she have a lot of trouble with how male centric SNL was in her day?

(I swear I read that somewhere.)

If that is true, the fact she'd stand up for Al means even more.

[yardwork]

41. Yes, and she wasn't into the drugs and partying.

When I worked with her in the early 1980s, she was a quiet, highly professional person. I don't believe that she would have signed this letter now if Al Franken had bothered her back then. That doesn't prove anything, but it's certainly a big point in his favor.

[NewJeffCT]

50. Thanks for that insight

those sorts of personal experiences do add to the credibility of the story.

[smirkymonkey]

8. Thanks! Good to see Jane Curtin and Laraine Newman on there.

A big thanks to all these women!

[Hugin]

9. Quite the distinguished list.

That they would take time out of their lives in support of Sen. Franken says much about him.

[brush]

18. EXCELLENT!

[Demsrule86]

2. Take that you 'not a bible between you' liar.

[lindysalsagal]

3. Good to see.

[spanone]

6. K&R...

[mucifer]

7. Compared to several hours and lots more women coming out about Charlie Rose

They tried to drag Arianna Huffington into this because she did a series of skits with her and Franken in bed together on Comedy Central back in 1996. I remember it was pretty funny. She said he never did any of this kind of behavior.

[octoberlib]

10. I did an OP about it. It was like something out of the Onion

it was so ridiculous.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029869811

[a kennedy]

11. Yeah, thank you ladies.......

[Timmygoat]

12. So why

With everyone on TV agreeing that all of these cases should be heard, why is no one saying that the women Trump abused should have their say?

[Cicada]

13. Some did not sign, a bit troubling

I worry about the absence of Tina Fey

[octoberlib]

14. Tina Fey and Al Franken did not work together. Different time periods.

This is signed by women who worked with Al Franken when he was at SNL.

[Cicada]

15. Thank you for that explanation

[mnhtnbb]

16. Tina Fey didn't start work at SNL until 1997 (behind the scenes). Franken was at SNL

from its inception in 1975 until 1980 and returned from 1985-1995.

Tina Fey was born in 1970.

[mcar]

17. K&R

[Farmer-Rick]

19. If his accusers are to be believed,

He only harassed RepubliCON, Trump supporters.

[spooky3]

23. Good point n/t

[Nevernose]

33. If his accusers are to be believed

He didn’t harass anyone.

He did pretend to grope a woman’s bosom.
There is a video of him performing his USO skit in which the female lead says, “I think you wrote this script so that you could kiss me,” so one can safely assume that it was performed again.
He did, indeed, put his hands on a woman’s waist during a state fair meet-and-greet.

[questionseverything]

44. he apoligized for how the women felt

and it clearly is not a pattern

<<bangs gavel

[Farmer-Rick]

49. Good point

I was kind of being sarcastic. I have some serious doubts about his accusers but to minimize their feelings is the go to response of serial abusers. So I'm walking a fine line.

I want to believe these 2 conservative Trump loving women but I feel they are not telling the truth.

[Dopers_Greed]

20. Let's see if CNN makes this headline news, like they did for the unverified accusers

My guess is "no"

[Honeycombe8]

21. Great! I know he's not a lech or a harasser, after watching him for years.

Comedians do over reach sometimes, reaching for the "gag." It's a personal thing with me that I give comedians a wide berth. The way a successful comedian works, and his mind works, is they go for the gag, push the envelope, and say and do things on the spur of the moment...which sometimes falls flat or is more offensive than they intended. Much of comedy is intended to be offensive about something. If they are too careful, they lose that edge that makes for a successful comedian or political satirist. Think of George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Bill Mahrer, Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart. It doesn't mean they aren't unnecessarily offensive or don't cross the line and it's wrong. But I give them room to make that mistake because of the nature of what they do. For someone else in another line of work, it would definitely be wrong, and I would blame them.

I think things should be judged, also, for the era those things occurred in. This routine is pretty offensive and I doubt would fly these days.

[robbob]

29. Great example (George Carlin)

Not a very politically correct routine. As I was watching it I was thinking if there are any rape survivors in the audience, or women who have been sexually assaulted or harassed, I bet they are not finding this “bit” funny at all.

[robbob]

36. Your comment also brought to mind Michael Richards

Aka Kramer, who destroyed his career with an attempt at edgy, “words you can’t say out loud” humour yelling the “N” word at some comedy club patrons. Totally unfunny, really bad comedy instincts, and he will be forever remembered as a racist idiot. All because he was trying to spontaneously “push the envelope” in a poorly thought out attempt at comedy.

[wolfie001]

47. Most uncomfortable "routine" I've ever witnessed!

Shivers!

[Gothmog]

24. Great letter from the SNL women performers

[womanofthehills]

25. Randi Rhodes worked with Al on Air America for yrs & she says Al was always a gentleman

She said no women ever complained about Al all the yrs she worked there.

[democratisphere]

26. Thank you ladies at SNL who worked with Al Franken.

Some sanity is being restored.

[wryter2000]

27. Trump will no doubt ask

Why Gilda Radner didn’t sign.

[BannonsLiver]

28. This will piss off a few people here

Especially the poster who has attempted to shout down and shame anyone who DARES to ask questions about Tweeden.

[octoberlib]

32. I don't care. I still think it's a political hit job.

[eissa]

34. Damn right it's a hit job.

I proudly stand with Al, and a big "fuck you" to anyone who lumps him in the same category as pedophile Moore, or a predator like Weinstein.

[apnu]

35. Its both a political hit job and harassment.

I'm sure my comment is going to fall flat with most because I am not taking part in the binary nature of the Internet's desire to distill everything down to black and white choices.

1) it is harassment.
No matter how we look at it, Franken was party to toxic sexuality towards women. It doesn't matter if Tweeden is in on a hit job or being used as a prop for a hit job or none of that and she's sincere or that she's a liar and all this is a set up. None of that matters.

Al Franken was party to juvenile toilet humor objectifying women's bodies. That he's a comedian doesn't matter. That the culture approves of it doesn't matter. That the target audience (soldiers) supposedly want that kind of entertainment doesn't matter.

Al Franken is a grown man with decades of experience and judgement and he let his judgment fail him. He took part in objectifying women, and today he knows it and he's apologized for it and I hope he'll work to stop it in the future.

2) it is a hit job.
The fact that Roger Stone tweeted about this a full day in advance is all the evidence I need to know this is a hit job. I don't know what Tweeden's involvement in it, and I don't care. She didn't come out with this on her own, this was planned and premeditated to injure Al Franken. Maybe Tweeden is willing in this, maybe she's been manipulated, the end result is some people in the Republican party ARE trying to co-opt #MeToo for their political gain. It fits a story they've long told that all Hollywood liberals are amoral jerks so they're running with it.

This is not to sway independents or rile liberals, though both of those things are fringe benefits. This is about feeding red meat to the base who was flagging thanks to that pedophile asshole Roy Moore.

There's a long list of creepy Republican sexual adventures and anything that lets them say "everybody does it" takes the pressure off them.

So they're trying to turn Al Franken into another Bill Clinton, a ghoul to be trotted out every time they need to change the subject.

Because they don't want to talk about Donald Trump's pussy grabbing. They don't want to talk about Larry Craig's bathroom games, they don't want to talk about David Vitter's Diapers and they don't want to talk about Mark Foley's pages. And they absolutely don't want to talk about Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill.

[wolfie001]

48. Tweeden's RW crap!

Poster must be a plant or deranged! Spineless "dem". Sickening

[zentrum]

30. Standing with them and Al!!

[Hassin Bin Sober]

31. I beginning to think he didn't even need to apologize for that stupid photo.

After seeing how sexually charged those skits were I think maybe that photo was just an extension of the atmosphere on those tours.

He didn't grope her in the photo. There was probably a lot of silliness going on during the tour. That photo was silly. No more no less.

[LisaM]

42. I would like to hear from some of the troops

who were there. See what they have to say about these shows and whether they appreciate Al Franken having been there.

[renegade000]

43. I think he was right for apologizing over the content of the joke...

But the problem is that now some people think he's apologizing for actually groping her.

[moondust]

37. Character witnesses

may end up being the final arbiters in a he-said-she-said situation like this that could lead to a flood of political smears and plain old revenge among the legitimate complaints.

[Dawson Leery]

38. The right is out to get every Democrat who may run in 2020.

These character witnesses demonstrate that Franken as integrity.

[L. Coyote]

39. Trumps support of a child molester makes me nostalgic for the days when he just supported Nazis.

Andy Borowitz on Facebook:

Trump’s support of a child molester makes me nostalgic for the days when he just supported Nazis.

[ProudProgressiveNow]

45. K&R nt

[IronLionZion]

46. It's interesting seeing which DUers like to throw Democrats under the bus

sure he did something stupid and wrong, but some people like to spin it into something very different as a way to bring down people in our party. Some DUers are the fifth column



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_column

[CincyDem]

51. What strikes me as a positive is the power distribution of the women who signed it...

...from on-camera stars (Curtin, Neuman) to women holding much less positional power in the organization relative to Franken. A predator won't go after an equal, they'll hunt out weaker prey, someone who might be susceptible to the implication that "I can have you fired".

So, seeing that list of women that spans the production team across a lot of levels, that's a good thing.

I didn't need convincing on Al but this is good reassurance.

[Gothmog]

52. This is a great letter