AL Franken, the former “Saturday Night Live” star, found out the hard way not to mess with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who chided Franken as if he were a delinquent schoolboy at Time Warner Center on Monday night.
Scalia, following in the footsteps of Karl Rove and Bill Clinton, was the guest at Conversations on the Circle, a series of one-on-one interviews with outgoing Time Inc. editor-in-chief Norman Pearlstine…
When Pearlstine opened the floor for Q&A, Franken stood up in the back row and started talking about “judicial demeanor” and asking “hypothetically” about whether a judge should recuse himself if he had gone duck-hunting or flown in a private jet with a party in a case before his court.
Franken was clumsily referring to the fact that Scalia had gone hunting and flying with Dick Cheney before the 2000 election.
First, Scalia lectured Franken, “Demeanor is the wrong word. You mean ethics.” Then he explained, “Ethics is governed by tradition. It has never been the case where you recuse because of friendship.”
…”I think I got under his skin a little,” Franken humbly told us.
