Sex writing by Franken cited in race

Minnesota Republicans unleashed one of their harshest piece of opposition research yet on Democratic Senate candidate Al Franken, pointing out a 2000 column, including graphic sexual descriptions, written by Franken for Playboy magazine.

The Minnesota Republican Party on Thursday circulated a letter from GOP women calling on Franken to apologize for the piece.

{mosads}The public airing of the column coincided with Republican objections to Playboy CEO Christie Hefner throwing a fundraiser for Franken.

In the column, titled “Porn-O-Rama!” and clearly intended to be humorous, Franken describes visiting a fictional sex institute where he participates in sex acts with machines and humans.

Franken writes of sitting in a virtual sex machine and choosing his preferred setting, then describes and evaluates the act. Later, he investigates other parts of the fictional institute and participates in other sexual acts that he describes.

In the same article, Franken jokes about his 12-year-old son researching a report on bestiality and using the Internet “to download some effective visual aids.” He makes up fake statistics comparing Playboy readers with readers of Hustler magazine.

Franken told The Hill last month that he’s not going to respond when Republicans bring up his past statements because “that’s all I’d do” — an allusion to the amount of material out there similar to the Playboy column.

Campaign spokesman Andy Barr indicated during the April interview that the campaign thought Republicans had already used their best opposition research against Franken.

On Thursday, Franken spokeswoman Jess McIntosh said: “Al had a long career as a satirist. But he understands the difference between what you say as a satirist and what you do as a senator. And as a senator, Norm Coleman has disrespected the people of Minnesota by putting the Exxons and Halliburtons ahead of working families. And there’s nothing funny about that.”

Franken’s history of sometimes crude and vulgar satire promises to be an issue throughout his race against Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.). Franken, a former “Saturday Night Live” star, is the Democratic favorite in next month’s state endorsing convention.

The GOP has also found traction recently by highlighting a series of tax problems involving Franken. The comedian failed to pay workers’ compensation insurance for employees of his personal corporation and also failed to pay income tax in 17 states in recent years.

Coleman’s campaign declined to comment.