Al Franken made people laugh for years on "Saturday Night Live" with goofy characters such as motivational speaker Stuart Smalley, but his inclinations turned more serious in 2004, when he helped give rise to Air America, a liberal political radio network.
Mr. Franken's show, originally called "The O'Franken Factor," ran as the centerpiece of Air America for nearly three years, until Franken left radio to campaign for a seat in the US Senate from his home state of Minnesota. Franken defeated incumbent Republican Sen. Norm Coleman by the narrowest of margins in the 2008 election – a manual statewide recount found he won by just 312 votes – and Senator Coleman disputed the result in court, only to have it upheld in June 2009.
In just over a year in the Senate, Franken has championed campaign finance reform and presided over the confirmation vote for Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan. He has also spoken out against the merger of NBC/Universal and Comcast.
