Plenty of current and former U.S. senators had memorable professions before they got to Washington: country fiddler (Robert Byrd of West Virginia), astronaut (John Glenn of Ohio), jewelry-maker (Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado). But none were dogged by a satirical persona, as is already happening to newly-confirmed Democratic Senator-elect Al Franken of Minnesota.

Franken, formerly a comedian and writer for “Saturday Night Live,” created the character Stuart Smalley, a cardigan-wearing self-help guru, often pictured gazing lovingly into a mirror and intoning, “I’m going to do a terrific show today! And I’m gonna help people! Because I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and, doggonit, people like me!”

Stuart showed up in many Web headlines noting Franken’s victory in the Minnesota senate race over Republican Norm Coleman, especially those with a conservative bent.

“No Joke! Stuart Smalley Headed to Senate” — www.thefoxnation.com

“Stuart Smalley Goes To Washington! Al Franken Gives Dems Super-Majority” — www.werushdaily.com

“Covering Al Franken: Stuart Smalley Saves The Senate!
Commentary: Can Journalists Look Past The Goofy Persona Of The Politician?” — www.cbsnews.com

So we ask you: Is there any way Franken can shed the ghost of Smalley? Does he need to?

Franken is lucky in at least one respect. The decision that cleared the way for him to take his Senate seat came during a quiet week in Washington. President Barack Obama holds a town hall meeting on health care in the Virginia suburbs. The morning television shows focused — again, still — on Michael Jackson and preparations for a memorial service at his California estate, Neverland. The Mark Sanford saga continues, with sympathy running high for the South Carolina governor’s wife Jenny after Sanford described his Argentine inamorata as his soulmate.

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Photo credit: REUTERS/Eric Miller (Franken and his wife Franni in Minneapolis on June 30, 2009)

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin says TV doppelganger Tina Fey and CBS News anchor Katie Couric have her to thank for the career boost they are getting.

In fact, the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee says, the pair of TV stars exploited her.

Fey, who has an uncanny resemblance to Palin, played a loopy version of the Alaska governor in “Saturday Night Live” skits on NBC during the campaign season.

And an interview Palin gave to Couric was damaging to Palin while also giving a ratings shot to Couric’s CBS Evening News, which generally is the No. 3 major broadcast news show behind NBC and ABC.

“I did see that Tina Fey was named entertainer of the year and Katie Couric’s ratings have risen,” Palin told documentary filmmaker John Ziegler on Monday.

“And I know that a lot of people are capitalizing on, oh I don’t know, perhaps some exploiting that was done via me, my family, my administration. That’s a little bit perplexing, but it also says a great deal about our society,” she said.

Ziegler interviewed Palin for a documentary about media coverage during the 2008 campaign in which Democrat Barack Obama defeated Republican John McCain.

Palin also said the news media was tougher on her than it has been on Caroline Kennedy, the Democrat from the famous political family who wants to replace Secretary of State-designate Hillary Clinton as a senator from New York.

REUTERS/staff photos (Palin and Fey combination photo)

REUTERS/Lucas Jackson (Couric presents award in New York)

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Just two days before the U.S. presidential election, Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden smells victory for Barack Obama.

Speaking at Florida State University in Tallahassee, his first in a three-stop swing through the battleground state of Florida on Sunday, Biden pointed to a dramatic bronze statue entitled “Unconquered” outside the university’s stadium.

“This is a great place to have this rally in front of the ‘Seminole Unconquered’. I tell you, I don’t think you ever approach this stadium without smelling victory in the air,” Biden said. 

The statue depicts a spear-brandishing Seminole Indian astride a rearing horse and was designed to “capture the indomitable spirit” of the Seminole people, says the university’s website. 
 

With polls showing Obama ahead of Republican John McCain, Florida Sen. Bill Nelson was also in an upbeat mood when he introduced Biden. 
 

“Do you smell victory in the air?,” Nelson said. “I suspect on Tuesday night we are going to be singing ‘happy days are here again’,” he told about 2,000 enthusiastic supporters. 
 

A small group of protesters shouted anti-Obama slogans on the outskirts of the rally and Biden had a message for them and other McCain supporters who were criticizing Obama. 
 

“Not only will we, but they in the parking lot (the protesters), they will be calling Barack Obama something else. They will call him President Obama — President Barack Obama, commander-in-chief of the United States of America.” 

Biden, who became a senator in 1972, poked fun at a skit on NBC’s ‘Saturday Night Live’ this weekend when McCain tried to sell a talking doll in the image of the Delaware senator. 

“I was told by one of my staff guys that I gotta get a Biden pull doll,” he said.

Photo credit: Reuters/Jason Reed (Biden and Obama campaign in Florida)

STEUBENVILLE, Ohio - It’s official. Republican John McCain is making an appearance on the popular comedy sketch show Saturday Night Live this weekend, just days before the November 4 election.

SNL has seen its ratings surge this season on the popularity of its political skits, especially actress Tina Fey’s portrayal of McCain’s running mate, Sarah Palin. 

Palin, who bears a striking resemblance to Fey, appeared on the show two weeks ago, boosting ratings and drawing positive reviews.

McCain, 72, is a joker on the campaign trail himself, often poking fun at his home state or his friends from the Senate. 

The Arizona senator has often said he would make appearances on late night variety shows to boost his appeal with younger voters, many of whom have flocked to the candidacy of his Democratic rival Barack Obama, who is ahead in opinion polls. 

The trip to New York, where the show is filmed, will take McCain out of important battleground states like Ohio and Florida just days before voters go to the polls, but the campaign clearly believes the time is well spent appealing, for free, to a national television audience. 

The appearance will be McCain’s third on the show.

REUTERS/Brian Snyder (McCain in Florida); REUTERS/staff (Palin and Fey)

WASHINGTON - Comedian Tina Fey says she’s checking out if her spitting image twin, Republican vice-presidential hopeful Sarah Palin, and White House contender John McCain win the general election next month.

Fey said she has loved playing Palin in the Saturday Night Live skits so far, especially with Amy Poehler who played Sen. Hillary Clinton in one and CBS News anchor Katie Couric in another.

“That lady is a media star.  She is a fascinating person, she’s very likeable.  She’s fun to play, and the two bits with Amy, that was super fun,” Fey told TV Guide. 

But a long-term gig isn’t in the cards.

“We’re gonna take it week by week. If she wins, I’m done,” she said. “I can’t do that for four years. And by ‘I’m done,’ I mean I’m leaving Earth.”

Fey has been hailed for her impressions of Palin, mocking in great detail her difficulties with media interviews and her lack of international experience.

For her part, Palin has tried to make the best of being the target of Fey’s humor. “I was just trying to give Tina Fey more material - job security for Saturday Night Live,” she told a rally earlier this month.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

Photo credit: Reuters/Mario Anzuoni (Fey and Poehler at the Emmy awards last month)

SAN FRANCISCO - Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin called Afghanistan “our neighboring country” on Sunday in a speech that could revive questions over her tendency to stumble into linguistic knots.

Three days after a mostly gaffe-free debate performance, the Alaska governor fumbled during a speech in which she praised U.S. soldiers for “fighting terrorism and protecting us and our democratic values”.

“They are also building schools for the Afghan children so that there is hope and opportunity in our neighboring country of Afghanistan,” she told several hundred supporters at a fundraising event in San Francisco.

The gaffe could add fuel to comedians and late-night talk show hosts who have seized on her linguistic infelicities to portray her as someone not to be taken seriously.

Later in a speech in Omaha, Neb., Palin poked a little fun at herself when talking about one comedian in particular — actress Tina Fey whose dead-on impression of Palin’s looks, voice and body language has been a hit.

Fey, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Palin, has parodied her as a rambling, perky politician unfamiliar with world issues for three straight weeks on the comedy show “Saturday Night Live”.

“I was just trying to give Tina Fey more material — job security for Saturday Night Live,” Palin said.

The skits have become a sensation since an awkward interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric in which Palin failed to coherently express her views about Russia, the U.S. government’s $700 billion financial bailout package, and the newspapers or magazines she reads.

In recent days, the 44-year-old self-described “hockey mom” has described the Couric interview as “less than successful”, and apologized to crowds of supporters for her shaky performance, saying she was “annoyed” and “impatient” because she wanted to talk about other issues like energy independence.

Palin’s opponent, Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden, has also committed high-profile gaffes, including claiming in a recent interview that President Franklin D. Roosevelt calmed fears in a TV address at the beginning of the Great Depression. There was no TV in 1929 — Roosevelt wasn’t president at the time. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/Brian Snyder (A Palin supporter at a rally in Denver last week.)

Politics and comedy collided once again on “Saturday Night Live” with Tina Fey reviving her dead-on Sarah Palin impression while Fred Armisen’s Barack Obama debated Darrell Hammond’s rendition of John McCain.

The NBC comedy show opened with Fey, wearing a pink jacket and turned out in Palin-esque eyeglasses and her trademark up-do, being interviewed by a a faux Katie Couric. Fey, who first portrayed the Republican vice presidential nominee on “SNL’s” season premiere, offered up titteringly silly answers to questions on foreign policy and her trip to New York City. She was especially disturbed during her visit to the United Nations by the high presence of foreigners there — jobs that she vowed would go to Americans in a McCain administration.

The recreation of Friday’s McCain-Obama debate featured a running gag in which McCain repeatedly proposed that he and Obama suspend their campaigns to either “hold a series of pie-eating contests,” “town hall meetings where you and I appear nude of semi-nude” or for the candidates to be air-dropped so they can search for Osama bin Laden.

The satire focused on McCain, including his contention that “I’ve always been disloyal to this president,” while his record within his own party showing that “the fact is, you simply cannot count on John McCain.”

Obama took a few hits as well, saying that if traditional diplomacy failed in negotiations with, say, North Korea, “playing the race card” would be his go-to plan.

Finally, on the idea for personal searching for bin Laden, McCain said he “would rather lose my life than win an election,” and when asked by the moderator if he really meant that, concluded, “Truthfully, yes, at this point I really don’t care anymore. I mean it.”

With just over a month left before the election, however, you can bet the “SNL” writers and performers care — a lot — about the comic fodder provided by the campaign.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

Photo credit: Reuters/Mario Anzuoni (Tina Fey (left), who impersonates Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on “Saturday Night Live,” show with “SNL” star Amy Poehler at the Governor’s Ball at the 60th annual Primetime Emmy Awards in Los Angeles September 21, 2008.)

MANCHESTER, N.H. - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has canceled plans to appear on the season premiere of Saturday Night Live after his campaign decided this weekend was not a time for humor in light of the expected devastation from Hurricane Ike.

In what may be the worst storm to hit Texas in nearly 50 years, the hurricane was packing high winds and U.S. officials warned storm waves could cause a catastrophe along the state’s coastline.

“In light of the unfolding crisis in Texas, Sen. Obama has decided it is no longer appropriate to appear on Saturday Night Live tomorrow evening,” said Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki.

Obama has been campaigning in the battleground state of New Hampshire and is to speak at a rally in Manchester on Saturday morning. Instead of flying to New York afterwards to appear on the show, Obama will fly back to his home in Chicago.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: NOAA handout