Over the years, Franken has shown a weird knack for accurately predicting the nominees in future presidential races. Usually the reasons he gives are ridiculous, but he's been right so many times it deserves notice.
His 1996 book Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot was written either before or during primary season for the '96 election. He assumed Bob Dole would be the nominee of the Republican Party, though probably everyone did at that point. He discussed two possible choices for Dole's running mate. His first guess was Jack Kemp, who turned out to be exactly who Dole selected. Franken based his guess on a quip by Newt Gingrich that Kemp (a former NFL star) has showered with more blacks than most Republicans have shaken hands with. Franken followed this quote with a list of "Politicians Who Have Showered With Blacks," consisting of athletes-turned-politicians. (After J.C. Watt's name is a footnote that says "is himself black.")
Franken's 1999 book Why Not Me? describes a bizarro version of the upcoming 2000 election in which Franken himself becomes the Democratic nominee, with an all-Jewish staff. And guess who his running mate is? Why, Joe Lieberman, of course. His stated reason is that he wants to balance the ticket because "I'm Reform and he's Orthodox."
Franken's 2003 book Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, in a section reprising "Operation Chickenhawk" from Big Fat Idiot, assumes John Kerry will be the Democratic nominee for the 2004 election. At the time, most pundits assumed Howard Dean would get the nomination.
Franken's 2005 book The Truth (With Jokes) features an epilogue in the form of a 2015 letter written to his grandkids Barack and Hillary. To Barack, he says, "I'll never forget the moment I first saw you in the maternity ward at the hospital, and your mother asked me to suggest a name. In retrospect, I guess it was kind of an obvious choice, but at the time I had no idea that Barack would soon become America's second most popular baby name, after Aidan."
At the time I read this, Obama had already told the press straight out that he would not run in 2008. I thought to myself, "I guess Franken is finally wrong in one of his predictions." Hmmmmph.
To be fair, I should mention that this same epilogue suggested that the Republican nominee for '08 would be Bill Frist.
What's Franken's secret? Good instincts, or dumb luck? You decide.