Beleaguered Franken campaign scores a puff piece in the Atlantic

Al Franken is falling further behind in the polls and facing down the doubts of Minnesota political pros, many of them in his own party, after the campaign was slow to stanch the bleeding from his tax imbroglio. But the campaign should be buoyed by the “He’s Not Joking,” a Joshua Green article about Franken that appears in the May issue of the Atlantic.

Green gets the stakes right: “Franken’s significance to Democrats stems not just from the opportunity to gain a seat in the Senate. Minnesota is a crucial swing state in the presidential race, and its governor, Tim Pawlenty, is a likely choice to become John McCain’s running mate. So a strong Democratic Senate candidate is a necessary bulwark. If November’s elections are anything like the wave that swept Democrats into office in 2006, the party will stand not only to regain the presidency but also possibly to win a veto-proof majority in the Senate. For that to happen, however, it will almost certainly need to carry Minnesota.”

Continued: Click “Read more”True enough, but from there the story devolves into one of those speak-no-evil celebrity profiles that would seem more at home in Vanity Fair. (“Franken has become a good enough campaigner that it’s easy to lose sight of just how audacious a move he’s trying to make.”)  In Green’s telling, the Franken campaign is not unseasoned and unprofessional, as local commentators from Larry Jacobs to MinMon analyst David Schultz [I] [II] have concluded, but instead youthful and exuberant.

It no doubt helped Franken’s cause that the profile was mainly reported back in February, shortly after the campaign launched its first — and to date, only — wave of TV ads and appeared to be doing well in polls. But as April turns to May, that all seems like ages ago.

More: Both Franken and Coleman have raked in big bucks from out-of-state contributions, but among in-state donors of $200 or more, Coleman had raised $1.6 million to Franken’s $740k as of March 3, according to Center for Responsive Politics data. (In fact, ex-candidate Mike Ciresi had raised more $200+ donations in Minnesota than Franken as of 3/3).