This month, Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., surpassed what should have been his one-year anniversary in the Senate. Instead, his swearing-in was delayed six months while the state sorted out an achingly close election that resulted in a 312-vote victory for Franken and a late arrival in Washington, D.C., that made him the 100th senator.

Painted by some Republicans as a potentially hyper-partisan member of the world’s most exclusive club, Franken has kept his head down … mostly. While Franken has refused any national television appearances, his celebrity status has led to interest in how he’s doing as a senator.

Nevertheless, his six-month tenure so far has been eventful. He recently visited Afghanistan as part of a U.S. delegation, and he’s passed two bills: one providing service dogs to wounded veterans and the other prohibiting government contracts with defense contractors who make employee arbitration mandatory, even in cases of assault. The latter is based on the case of Jamie Leigh Jones, a former KBR employee in Iraq who sued after allegedly being drugged by co-workers, gang-raped and held in a shipping container.

Franken also got attention during the contentious health care debate, not only for his support of the public option but also for inserting a rule into the bill requiring insurers to spend 85 percent of premiums on health care.

And he lit up the blogosphere when he refused Joe Lieberman extra time to make a speech (as a freshman, Franken’s hands were tied) and tangling with South Dakota Sen. John Thune over the senior Republican’s characterization of the health care bill moving through Congress.

The Pioneer Press spoke to Franken recently about his first six months on the job. The interview has been edited for length:

Q Well, that was an eventful six months, wasn’t it?

A Yeah, I came at a good time. A consequential period.

Q You went in saying you didn’t want to be the 100th senator, but the second Minnesota senator. How would you rate your first six months in office?

A Well, I think I did very well by Minnesota. I kept my head down and did my job. There was a couple areas in which I was helping Minnesota agriculture. Got the (U.S.) Department of Agriculture to purchase $50 million in pork to help our pork farmers. … And on dairy, there were a number of dairy states that got (Secretary of Agriculture) Tom Vilsack to raise supports. So, just in direct response to the crisis in both of those, especially in dairy but also in pork, (I) acted on behalf of our farmers.

In the health care debate, I really think, you know, representing a state that delivers very high-quality care for relatively low cost, was an advantage for me in the debate. And then I got the medical-loss ratio put in there. And there’s no reason that all insurance companies can’t get to 85 percent.

And you know what that means. It means that they have to use 85 percent of the premiums it receives to deliver actual health care. And I think that in sort of the absence of the public option, it’s one of the strongest tools that we have in the whole bill … to keep costs down, to keep insurance companies honest.

Q Is there a proudest accomplishment for you?

A I’d say the proudest accomplishment is just the overall impact I had on the health care bill. It may not have been the highest-profile stuff, but I think it’s stuff that both reflects Minnesota’s values and what Minnesota has done well, and will also ultimately not just benefit Minnesota, but benefit the whole way that health care is delivered.

I’m also very proud of the Jamie Leigh Jones amendment. … And the service-dogs bill is also something that I really, really cared about, and it just made a lot of sense.

Q You get a lot of attention on the blogs and elsewhere, maybe second only to Michele Bachmann among Minnesota politicians. People seem to follow your every step. Does that affect what you can do in the Senate? Does it help? Does it hurt?

A I try to ignore that stuff. I know we got all this attention on the Lieberman thing, which was really much ado about nothing, and so — I have very good relations with Joe. At least half my bills are co-sponsored by Republicans. Part of the blogosphere is trying to say there’s a rift between me and Republican colleagues. And that’s certainly not true.

Q What was the most surprising thing to you about becoming a U.S. senator?

A I think the most surprising (is) sort of the lack of real debate, especially between the two parties, especially on the health care thing. …

I must have done between 10 and 15 roundtables on health care, with providers, doctors and hospitals, with insurance companies, nurses, health care economists, with public health people, rural health, one on health care disparities. And, you know, that was because I wanted to reform health care. … And every member of the Democratic caucus did the same. And I felt like the Republican caucus in the Senate did not do that. And that they were not invested in reforming health care; they were invested in stopping the Democratic … reform of health care.

What was disappointing to me was what came from the other side, or from opponents of health care. (It) seemed to be kind of talking points. There wasn’t much behind them. And also quite a bit of disinformation.

Q Polls show voters have an extremely low opinion of Congress. Why do you think that is, and how can it be changed?

A I think it’s because they see things like that. I was sort of saddened by that. I would like to see give and take.

Q So part of the problem is the rancor?

A The rancor comes and goes. That’s one of the things I’ve learned. There’s some times that you go after each other on the floor. It used to be more that you’d go after each other on the floor, and then you’d go out to dinner. Now, there’s less of that. There’s a lot more going back home on Thursday. And that’s good. I like coming back home to Minnesota and I think it’s very important to do that. The loss is sort of that the members don’t have time to play poker or go out with members of the other party to dinner, and get their wives to know each other, and their children. … I think that there’s been a change in the culture that has not been good for the tone.

Q Health care, of course, dominated the year. You were a strong supporter of the public option. Is this still a good bill without it? Is this still health care reform without the public option?

A Oh, yeah. It’s doing so much. It’s going to cover 31 million more people. It’s going to make these insurance reforms to make people’s health insurance a lot more secure — the pre-existing condition exclusion, getting rid of that, (and) annual or lifetime (coverage) limits. There’s so much in this, and there’s so much on the other side on cost control on things that I believe will … slow the increase in the cost. I think this is a very good bill. I would remind folks who are very disappointed, as I was, about the public option not surviving that one, the creator of the public option, Jacob Hacker, is for the bill. And secondly that Social Security, when it started, was for widows and orphans. And that was it. So this isn’t the end of this.

Q There are political consequences to tackling big issues. Did the White House make a mistake by taking on health care in the first year?

A No. I think it was a huge part of the debate during the campaign. I think they were wise to do it. I wish it had gone faster.

Q You made a point of trying to keep your head down and work hard, as you’ve said, but there was a moment when the feisty Al Franken showed up. Talk about what happened with John Thune on the floor that day.

A What happened was that (Thune) had this (health care) chart out, saying that taxes start in (18) days, and benefits don’t start for 1,400 days. The gist of it was that nothing started until 2014. And that just isn’t the case. … So I went up to him and said, “John, did you include any of the things that are kicking in right away?” There’s a lot of stuff that is kicking in right away — your kid will be covered until their 27th birthday, there’ll be subsidies for small businesses, there’ll be many new policies that eliminate these (coverage) exclusions. There’s a whole bunch of stuff. The (Medicare Part D) doughnut hole will be mostly closed for seniors, et cetera. And he said, “No.”

So the most egregious thing I did was I didn’t know that (on the floor) you cannot characterize a conversation that you had with a colleague. … I kind of knew that and kind of thought it wasn’t that controversial because he’d just given the speech. And I said: “I’ve just talked to my colleague. He has this chart here; I asked him if he had mentioned anything and he said, ‘No.’ ” So that was a no-no, what I did. So for that, I actually went and apologized to him for, but what I didn’t apologize for was, John had said things like, “This will not extend the solvency of Medicare for even one day.” And, the (Congressional Budget Office) says nine years. And I used the old (Sen. Daniel Patrick) Moynihan thing that you’re entitled to your own opinions, you’re not entitled to your own facts.

Q We’ve talked a little bit about you working with Republicans on the other side of the aisle on some of the bills and other things. Is it also true you co-wrote a song with Orrin Hatch?

A Yes. Basically, I’d actually heard some of Orrin’s songs a while ago, which were more devotional songs. This is from years ago. And they were pretty good. They were OK. So then the first or second day there, I told Orrin, “You know, I just want to hear some of your music.” …

So then it occurred to me that I had written a song which was a duet, a country duet, called “We Stay Together for the Kids.” And that it needed a bridge. And I had done a demo, too. I’d actually been in Nashville once and got some session musicians together and a woman singer and we’d done a version of it. And I really liked the song except it really needs a bridge. So I said to Orrin, “Can I send you a song? I’d like to write a bridge with you.” …

And so the last week of our session, we sat in his office for about an hour and a half and wrote the bridge. I think his assistant was wondering what was going on because we were laughing a lot. I think we finished the bridge in about 45 minutes and spent about 45 minutes talking about all kinds of things.

Q This year, does Congress lay low coming off this huge, contentious health care debate? Or can it still tackle things like climate change?

A That’s a really good question. We need an energy bill, because I think an energy bill is a jobs bill. I’m a little afraid that this incredible contentiousness is going to make it a little harder to do something that includes cap-and-trade and may put that on a slower track.

But I do know that we’re going to turn our attention right away to jobs. I go to all kinds of meetings with mayors and city councils and chambers of commerce around the state, and I’m hearing that we’re not getting money to Main Street. … I’ve written a letter with a number of other senators saying we need to get at least $40 billion of the TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) money directly to Main Street, and we can do that through community banks, the kind of banks that weren’t bailed out during the TARP. …

And there’s other kinds of jobs. We’re retrofitting buildings, homes, put people in the building trades to upgrade our building stock, our housing stock, and save energy all at the same time.

Q How do you and your wife, Franni, like living in D.C.?

A We really like it, but we work really hard. We’re not going out much. … We sit and do our homework. We’re not like gallivanting around town going to, you know, (retired Washington Post editor) Ben Bradlee’s house. I’m not sure what the big parties are, what the salons are in Washington. I haven’t been to one of those. It’d be fine, I’d like to. …

We’re very happy, we’re very happy. I can walk to my office. My life is pretty much sort of that walk to the office.