The Truth (with Jokes)

The Truth (With Jokes) is an American book of political satire and humor by Al Franken, released in October 2005. The book's main focus is on the 2004 presidential election and Franken's research into the Republicans' strategy in their victory—as well as examples of subsequent political overreach which he predicts will be their downfall. Finally, he makes some predictions about the future.

Book I: The Triumph of Evil

The book opens with a retelling of the aftermath of November 2, 2004, as all the major news stations claim that incumbent U.S. President George W. Bush—reelected with an historically narrow margin over his Democratic opponent, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, of less than 2.5 percentage points—won an "ideological mandate" in this election. Franken points to the previous low point for incumbent presidents' reelections, Woodrow Wilson's 3.2-point 1916 victory, juxtaposes them with the landslide reelection victories of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936, Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1956, Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964, Richard Nixon in 1972, and Ronald Reagan in 1984, and counter-argues that Bush's margin of victory was nowhere close to these lopsided contests; further, Franken points out that Bush's margin was 6 points narrower than that of Bill Clinton in 1996 over Republican challenger Bob Dole, and that nobody considered that victory a "mandate".

The Truth (podcast)

The Truth is a fiction podcast that seeks to re-imagine what audio drama is and can be. The podcast is released every two weeks. The tagline for the organization is "Movie for your ears". Stories are developed as a collective where frequently the dialogue is completely improvised. Additionally, recordings are made on location and then taken into the studio to be edited. Work by The Truth has been heard on many nationally syndicated public radio programs, including This American Life, Studio 360, Snap Judgment, and The Story (see Links below). The show is part of podcast network Radiotopia.

The Truth stories, while fictional, are often topical and possible. The pilot episode was inspired by the real speech "In Event of Moon Disaster" written for President Richard Nixon in case the Apollo 11 mission failed.

History

In 2009 Jonathan Mitchell started The Truth with Hillary Frank. Frank had been Mitchell's editor on a story for a show produced by American Public Media (APM) called Weekend America, titled "Eat Cake." The piece was intended to air on Valentine's Day weekend, but Weekend America was cancelled while the story was in production and the last episode was January 29, 2009. Weekend America decided to air the story anyway, on that last broadcast. Peter Clowney, the executive producer at Weekend America, was then moved into a development position at American Public Media. Mitchell and Frank pitched him the idea of doing a regular drama series along the lines of "Eat Cake". The title "The Truth" comes from a quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson, that goes, "fiction reveals truth that reality obscures."