Why Not Me?

First edition
Author	Al Franken
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Political satire
Publisher	Delacorte Press
Publication date	12 January 1999
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
ISBN	0-385-32924-5

Why Not Me? is a 1999 political satire novel by Al Franken.

Synopsis

Franken campaigning for U.S. Senate

The book is made up of three different sections. First is Franken's autobiography, Daring to Lead. Second is a campaign diary, following Franken and his campaign staff across the primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire. The final section, supposedly written by Bob Woodward, is a behind-the-scenes account of Franken's first hundred days as president, titled The Void. There is also an epilogue, set several decades after the plot, giving historical perspective on the Franken presidency and Franken's post-presidential life.

Characters

• Otto Franken – Al's violent and alcoholic (fictional) brother, who attacks members of the press with two-by-fours and disguises himself and uses aliases like "Dotto Dranken", "Botto Branken" and "Klotto Klanken" to mock Al Gore.
• Dan Haggerty – TV's Grizzly Adams, whom the campaign uses for celebrity endorsement.
• Norm Ornstein – A well-respected fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and friend of Franken. He is the campaign manager, and later the White House chief of staff.
• Howard Fineman – former Newsweek reporter who is goaded into being the Franken campaign's public relations spokesman, and later becomes the White House press secretary.
• Dick Morris – A famous pollster for Bill Clinton who joins Franken's campaign to develop strategy and raise money.
• Frank Luntz – a Republican pollster who, Al thinks, is on the campaign only because he's a "starfucker."
• Joe Lieberman – Franken's vice president. In reality, Lieberman declared himself an Independent after the elections.
• Sandy Koufax – former professional baseball player who becomes Franken's Secretary of Veterans Affairs.
• Al Gore – former vice president whom Franken politically destroyed during the 2000 Iowa primary; later became a congressman from Tennessee.
• Franni Franken – Al's (real life) wife who is eventually used by the campaign after a heroic rescue of an old man in New Hampshire.

Writing style

Franken writes his own character as a blowhard who does not fully understand political issues and who, therefore, falls back on such clichés as "The United States is the only remaining Superpower."

In the (fictional) Franken diary, he uses initials to refer to various people and political blocs, such as "O." for his fictional brother, Otto, and "S.P." for the supposedly "stupid people" whom he meets every time he attends a political rally. He also uses initials to refer to various young women with whom he is having affairs, the fact of which he hopes to conceal from his wife.

In the first part of the book, he portrays his children, Thomasin and Joseph (real people), as being against his running for the Presidency.

Parallels to future events

Franken correctly predicted that Joe Lieberman would be the Democratic Party's vice presidential nominee in the 2000 presidential election.

In 2008, Franken officially announced his candidacy for Norm Coleman's Minnesota seat in the U.S. Senate in the 2008 election.^[1] He was eventually victorious, following a protracted recount.

In 2017, several columnists wrote about the possibility of Franken running in the 2020 United States presidential election,^[2][3][4] in spite of his dismissing the idea the prior year.^[5]

In 2017, Franken was accused by various women of sexual misconduct before and after his time as a U.S. Senator. This is similar to what he claims to do in the diary section of the book.

References