Al Franken

“The Republican agenda is a radical vision in which Medicaid is slashed to the bone - in which we start to balance the budget on the backs of, literally, our most vulnerable citizens.”

“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.”

“If you look at terrorists, they really have no sense of humor.”

“In my first week as a U.S. senator, I had the privilege of participating in the Supreme Court confirmation hearing for Judge Sonia Sotomayor.”

“Humor and seriousness are not in opposition to each other.”

“Bob Dole used to be really funny. Barney Frank can be kind of funny. Bob Kerrey has a good sense of humor.”

“I got interested in politics during the civil rights movement and then Vietnam.”

“I hope you realize, in a democracy, laughter is assent.”

“The institutions that we've built up over the years to protect our individual privacy rights from the government don't apply to the private sector. The Fourth Amendment doesn't apply to corporations. The Freedom of Information Act doesn't apply to Silicon Valley. And you can't impeach Google if it breaks its 'Don't be evil' campaign pledge.”

“The way I see it, I'm not going to Washington to be the 60th Democratic senator. I'm going to Washington to be the second senator from the state of Minnesota.”

“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.”

“Service dogs raise their masters' sense of well-being.”

“I think Hell exists on Earth. It's a psychological state, or it can be a physical state. People who have severe mental illness are in Hell. People who have lost a loved one are in Hell. I think there are all kinds of different hells. It's not a place you go to after you die.”

“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.”

“The Minnesotans I talk to are really concerned about what the future holds for their families. They're trying to pay for health care and send their kids to college, they're worried about declining home values, they're scared for a loved one they have serving in Iraq.”

“My daughter became a teacher right out of college.”

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

“My dad was a terrible businessman.”

“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.”

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