Eric Ulrich (Photo: Facebook)

This morning, Queens Councilman Eric Ulrich took to his Facebook page to post a scathing review of Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in The House of God, an HBO documentary on the sex abuse scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church. Mr. Ulrich had several issues with the film, which he characterized as "an exploitive and biased account of a dark chapter in the history of the Catholic Church."

"As a proud Roman Catholic, I am truly offended by the blatant bigotry contained in HBO's so-called documentary Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in The House of God," Mr. Ulrich wrote. "It accuses His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI of being complicit in covering up sex abuses cases involving Catholic priests and unfairly criticizes the late Pope John Paul II. Above all, its chock full of anti-catholic rhetoric and demonizes members of the clergy (most of whom are dedicated, compassionate and pious men)."

Mr. Ulrich went on to criticize the movie for not noting the things the Church has done to combat sexual abuse in the wake of the scandals.

"The film does not include any of the steps the church has taken to protect children nor does it accurately depict how the church has tried to heal the emotional and psychological suffering of sex abuse victims. Instead, it glorifies trial lawyers as moral crusaders," wrote Mr. Ulrich. "If you’re looking for an exploitive and biased account of a dark chapter in the history of the Catholic Church, this film is for you."

Mea Maxima Culpa premiered on HBO February 4 and is airing on the cable channel throughout the month. It was directed by Oscar winner Alex Gibney and focuses on a number of sex abuse cases, the ensuing lawsuits and criticizes how the Pope and other Church officials responded to the situation. Politicker reached out to HBO to discuss Mr. Ulrich's gripes with the film, but as of this writing, we have yet to receive a response.

Lena Dunham (Photo: Twitter)

Lena Dunham, the star and creator of HBO's zeitgeisty comedy Girls, took to Twitter this afternoon to fight back against reports she did not vote in the presidential election last year despite filming a controversial ad urging others to cast a ballot for President Barack Obama. According to officials at the Board of Elections in Brooklyn, Ms. Dunham's claim she voted by affidavit ballot may have merit.

Last night, the Room Eight blog reported "a Lena Dunham ... registered in Brooklyn did not vote in the 2012 general election or in any local elections since she moved from her prior address in Tribeca." Gawker also noted it seemed like Ms. Dunham may have been on vacation in India during the election. In a series of tweets this afternoon, Ms. Dunham shot down the reports and said she flew back to New York to vote and submitted an affidavit ballot at her old polling place in Manhattan.

"Hey kids, some people on the internet are saying I didn't vote. Some of them are still mad I used a sexy metaphor re: voting. Read on: I did vote. I tried to get an absentee ballot but, because our nation's voting system is a steampunk cornmaze, it didn't arrive," Ms. Dunham wrote. "So not to be a martyr about it but I flew to New York to vote. I wasn't sure if my change of address had officially been registered so... ...I went to my old polling place with my dad, where they let me vote by affidavit (what was totally allowed.)"

Two Board of Elections officials told Politicker that, because of the executive order issued by Governor Andrew Cuomo in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, New York City voters were permitted to use affidavit ballots at any location in the state. Though Ms. Dunham's voter history file does not show her as having participated in the election, the BOE said they are "still working on the voter history for last year's elections" and do not have complete information for everyone who submitted affidavit ballots in the presidential election. Records show Ms. Dunham, an unaffiliated voter, cast a ballot in the 2008 presidential election and successfully changed her registration's address to Brooklyn at a later date.

For her part, Ms. Dunham finished her attempt to shoot down the reports about her vote with a characteristically sarcastic reference to her public support of President Obama.

"Obviously I voted for Romney. I hope everyone has a nice day," she wrote.

Nikki Finke during her days in Mr. Koch's office as depicted in a 1974 New York Times engagement notice.

Former New York Mayor Ed Koch has had an influence in Hollywood as well as the Big Apple. Before coming to City Hall, Mr. Koch spent eight years in the House of Representatives. One of his staffers was Nikki Finke, who went on to become one of the most influential and feared reporters in the entertainment industry and, according to Ms. Finke, her time working with the future mayor in Congress helped inspire her to become a journalist. 

Politicker spoke to Mr. Koch yesterday about the upcoming release of Koch, a documentary about his career that hits theaters February 1. During the interview, we asked him if he recalled working with Ms. Finke.

"I remember her," he said.

However, Mr. Koch was not aware his former staffer had gone on to become a big name in Hollywood.

"I didn't know, I mean I think she went to a magazine when she left us," he said. "Isn't that nice."

We also filled Mr. Koch in on some other aspects of Ms. Finke's career including that she has a reputation for being rather reclusive and has rarely been photographed.

"A recluse?! She was a very pretty woman," he said with audible surprise. "I don't remember other than that. She was very nice, but nothing special."

In Hollywood, Ms. Finke is known for aggressively responding to those who cross her or get in the way of her constant stream of scoops. Mr. Koch said he had no way of knowing whether not Ms. Finke displayed the same toughness as a young woman.

"She may have been tough, but she was an intern or a--she was not a major figure in my office where she could be tough," he explained.

Ms. Finke told us she was "shocked" Mr. Koch remembered her.

"I'm just very flattered that he even remembers me," she said, adding, "He was an incredibly sweet man."

According to Ms. Finke, working in Mr. Koch's Washington office was her "first job out of college."

"I was just out of Wellesley, I was an ex-debutante. I was a very different person in those days than I am now, I was very sweet, I really was," said Ms. Finke. "It was so exciting. I had my own parking space. ... He had great offices. ... It was very exciting, you know, and every now and then, somebody would ask you to go to the House dining room. I mean, it was really exciting and you felt like, 'Oh my god.'"

Ms. Finke believes Mr. Koch's aides may have hired her because he was hoping to secure donations from her family. If this was indeed the reason behind Ms. Finke's hiring, it was misguided since Mr. Koch's Democratic politics were not a fit with her parents.

"I was always a knee-jerk liberal. But here's the funny part, this is the money quote, I think they hired me thinking that maybe my family would give him money," Ms. Finke said. "They didn't realize, nobody asked me, my parents were Republicans."

Though Mr. Koch remembered Ms. Finke, he got one detail wrong--she wasn't an intern. A 1974 New York Times engagement notice for Ms. Finke referred to her as a "staff assistant" in Mr. Koch's office.

"I was a staffer, probaly the lowest level staffer in the entire thing," she recalled. "I wasn't a receptionist, I would sort of like do anything. I had been editor-in-chief of the college newspaper of Wellesley and I think what they thought was when they hired me that I could help them with press releases, because he really cared about the press, and I could do a little bit of baby legislative stuff."

Working on Mr. Koch's communications team helped Ms. Finke decide to aim for a career in media rather than politics. She said seeing the power reporters wielded in Washington was "absolutely" a big part of what inspired her to be a professional journalist.

"At that point, I wanted a career in politics. I was a political science major and I wasn't really thinking about journalism, but when I saw the way Ed and his staff would genuflect to journalists, I went, 'Oh, I want to do that,'" Ms. Finke explained. "You know, the minute a journalist called him, he jumped on the phone."

After her time on Mr. Koch's staff, Ms. Finke took a job with the Associated Press. However, she wasn't done with Mr. Koch and his team.

When Mr. Koch first ran for mayor in 1977, Ms. Finke said she was working on the A.P.'s foreign desk in New York. Based on her experience in Mr. Koch's office her bosses there decided to have her cover his campaign. This apparently allowed her to accomplish her goal of commanding respect and attention.

"There was a lot nervousness inside the campaign over 'What did I know when?'" she said with a laugh. "His staff was, like, terrified. That was very funny."

"Chicks With Steve Buscemeyes" debuted in April 2011 and instantly became a viral hit. The site features images of attractive female celebrities with Mr. Buscemi's eyes photoshopped over their famous faces.

Since Mr. Buscemi's fundraiser for Public Advocate Bill de Blasio next month inspired this post we obviously started with him for our take on the meme. Click on the Buscemeyed version of Mr. de Blasio to see a slideshow with the rest of the mayoral hopefuls getting the Buscemi treatment.

David Petraeus and Paula Broadwell. (Photo: PaulaBroadwell.com)

Writers who craft the infamous "ripped from the headlines" plots on Law & Order: SVU are apparently having trouble keeping up with the ongoing scandal over former CIA Director and retired general David Petraeus' affair with his biographer. Now that the story has grown to include another general and an FBI agent accused of sending shirtless pictures of himself to a woman the man in charge of the sex crimes-focused cop show sent a tweet begging for mercy. He also threw in Sesame Street muppet Elmo, who had a sex scandal of his own break this week.

"Memo to:FBI/CIA/NATO/SesameStreet From:SVU Writers' Room--Please slow it down, we're having a hard time getting this all down," wrote SVU showrunner Warren Leight this morning.

Mr. Leight's request came a few hours after a nearly identical tweet sent last night that was just directed at the FBI and the CIA. Sounds like we can look forward to an SVU episode chock full of muppets, spies and soldiers as long as the show's writers manage to make it through this experience without crippling carpal tunnel.

They might not be within SVU's budget, but Politicker would like to humbly suggest Mad Men's John Slattery might make a good Petraeus and French actress Marion Cotillard is a pretty solid lookalike for the ex-spy's lover, Paula Broadwell. There is clearly only one choice to play Elmo.

Alec Baldwin (Photo: Getty)

A new poll of the race to replace term-limited New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg released last night included actor Alec Baldwin, who has hinted he might run for mayor. Based on the numbers, Mr. Baldwin might want to abandon his dream of sitting in City Hall. According to the poll, which was conducted by NY1 and Marist College, 66 percent of New York voters don't want Mr. Baldwin to even try running for mayor. 

Just 18 percent of registered New Yorkers said they'd like to see Mr. Baldwin make a mayoral bid while 16 percent were "unsure." Though Mr. Baldwin has earned a reputation as an outspoken liberal, opposition to him cut across party lines with 69 percent of Democrats and 70 percent of Republicans saying they don't want him to enter the mayoral race.

Mr. Baldwin performed even more poorly in the poll than scandal-scarred former Congressman Anthony Weiner and ex-Governor Eliot Spitzer.

The poll indicated 25 percent of New York voters would like to see Mr. Weiner, who resigned from the House of Representatives in June 2011, after he was caught sending lewd Twitter messages to multiple women, make a run for mayor while 58 percent of voters would prefer to see him stay out of the race. Mr. Spitzer, who left the governor's mansion in 2008 after he was busted for patronizing a prostitution ring, performed slightly better with 30 percent of voters saying they'd like to see him mount a mayoral campaign and 57 percent saying they want him to stay far from City Hall.

Politicker reached out to Mr. Baldwin to discuss the poll results. As of this writing, we have yet to receive a response.

Arnold Schwarzenegger mugging for the cameras at McNally-Jackson (Photo: Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke)

Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger held an impromptu book signing at indie bookstore McNally-Jackson in Nolita this afternoon. Mr. Schwarzenegger announced the surprise signing via Twitter and in a note on Facebook leading a crowd of over 100 almost exclusively male fans to rush downtown to shake the Governator’s large hand and have him sign copies of his tome Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story.

Mr. Schwarzenegger's arrival was preceded by a surprisingly mellow soundtrack featuring Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel and Leonard Cohen. Just about five minutes after the scheduled start of the signing, Mr. Schwarzenegger strolled in, wearing a dark suit, cowboy boots with an Americana pattern and a skull ring nearly as large as his finger. The body builder-turned-politician then sat down to autograph his autobiography at a table next to a cardboard cutout of him in his prime (i.e., flexing in a bikini).

“Thank you so much for putting this together so quickly,” whispered a publicist from Simon & Schuster, the book’s publisher.

Although the Governator’s handlers claimed the event was planned last night, bookstore staff told The Observer they were given a head’s up about the signing late last week.

“You working out? You look pumped up,” Mr. Schwarzengger said as he shook hands, signed books and posed for pictures with fans.

“You know anything about watches? This is a Legacy,” Mr. Schwarzenegger told one fan who complimented the timepiece sticking out from the cuff of his suit jacket. Apparently, the Legacy watch is a good choice for those with large forearms, as it dwarfed Mr. Schwarzenegger’s sizeable wrist.

The Governor was not supposed to pose for pictures or sign anything other than books, but he generously did both.

Reporters were allowed in a small roped off area adjacent to Mr. Schwarzenegger's table and informed they would not be permitted to ask questions. One brave soul from Inside Edition attempted to circumvent the ban.

“You were great on GMA,” she yelled before being gently reminded the Governor was not speaking with the press.

Probably due to the crackdown on reporters, the only remote reference to the love child scandal Ms. Schwarzenegger endured last year at the signing was a fan who said to him, “What happened happened...You are doing the right thing.”

“Thanks. Have a nice day,” the Governor mumbled, before posing for yet another cellphone picture.

Outside the event, where the line of Mr. Schwarzenegger's admirers snaked around Prince Street and more media staked out the signing, it was a different story. Another Inside Edition reporter and a cameraman interviewed fans who exited the signing and asked their thoughts on the Governator's past transgressions.

"You can't judge somebody," said one man who identified himself as a member of an online Schwarzenegger fan club.

"Yes you can!" shouted another man who had been standing in the street watching the proceedings.

An earpiece-clad member of Mr. Schwarzenegger's security team kept watch over the line, enforcing a rule that only those who purchased books could have an audience with the Governator and helping several bewildered patrons who showed up to shop at McNally-Jackson with no idea they were walking into an autograph signing. At one point, we overheard him on the phone with a colleague saying, "Find me a cigar store."

Knowing Mr. Schwarzenegger is a big fan of fine, hand-rolled cigars, we piped in and recommended nearby Mulberry Street Cigars in Little Italy. The security staffer dispensed Mr. Schwarzenegger's personal assistant to check out the cigar shop.

Inside, all 162 copies of Mr. Schwarzenegger’s memoir in stock at McNally-Jackson sold out before the line finished. Fans who were unable to buy books asked if they could pre-order with the store or online and still get pictures with the Governator. The security team informed them there wouldn't be enough time, but, in an attempt to alleviate the disappointment, Mr. Schwarzenegger posed with his last remaining admirers.

One of his handlers told him he had to retake the picture because it was too blurry.

“So don’t shake,” Mr. Schwarzenegger said. “Somebody is schvitzing.”

“Don’t worry, he’ll be back,” somebody said, as the Governor and his entourage departed the bookstore.

Outside, Mr. Schwarzenegger entered his car without taking questions from any of the assembled media. Thinking that, perhaps he and his team had taken us up on our cigar store recommendation, we headed down Mulberry Street to see if we might have another shot to speak with the Governator.

When we arrived, we found Mulberry Street Cigars had the lights off and was closed for the day. It seemed both The Observer and the cigar store missed our respective shots at having a moment with Mr. Schwarzenegger.

Ed Koch (Photo: Getty)

Former Mayor Ed Koch is an avid movie watcher who maintains an email list where  he sends out his reviews. His review of the news sports drama "Trouble with the Curve" was released earlier today and it is particularly amusing. Mr. Koch, who labeled the film "really bad," was clearly not a fan.

Specifically, he was upset with the lack of on-screen romance between the film's two younger stars.

"Mickey (Amy Adams), tries desperately to help her dad recruit promising players. Mickey's love interest is Johnny (Justin Timberlake), but there is no chemistry on screen between the two of them," the former mayor wrote.

What's more, Mr. Koch didn't appreciate that Mr. Timberlake and Ms. Adams did not disrobe completely during a particularly romantic scene.

"Everything about this picture is wrong," he continued. "At one point in the film Mickey and Johnny skinny dip--neither of them remove their underclothes. Avoid."

Mr. Koch also took aim at the movie's other star, Clint Eastwood.

"Clint Eastwood did not direct this film," he wrote. "Eastwood did, however, direct his skit during the Republican Convention when he had his 15 minutes in the sun. It was an embarrassment for those who watched it."

Mr. Koch also included a review of the acclaimed documentary "Searching For Sugar Man" in his email today. He was much more enthusiastic about that film, which he described as "peaceful, comforting and occasionally lyrical."

Spike Lee (Photo: Getty)

Director Spike Lee gave a lengthy interview to New York magazine to promote his upcoming film Red Hook Summer and he shared his thoughts on Mayor Michael Bloomberg's controversial soda ban and the presidential election. Initially, Mr. Lee's only comment on the mayor was that he's a "fellow New York Knicks season-ticket holder," but after some prodding from New York contributing editor Will Leitch, Mr. Lee went on to say he thinks Mr. Bloomberg's legacy "took a blow" with his pursuit of a third term. Though Mr. Lee didn't seem too supportive of Mr. Bloomberg maneuvering around the old two term limit, he gave the soda ban a much more positive review.

"I’m in favor of it. Look, when I was growing up in Brooklyn, we had gym, and you had to run. You had some physical activity. Children today in public schools across the country are not being taught art, are not being taught music, and they have no physical ed. Obesity is a major, major problem in this country," Mr. Lee said. "Americans—we’re just obese. It’s crazy. Ask ­African-Americans. We are way over ­index on obesity, which means we are over index on diabetes, heart disease, and it goes down the line."

Mr. Lee also gave his thoughts on the presidential election. The director, who has hosted benefits for President Barack Obama, said he believes the elections will be "very, very, very close," but he has "faith" the president will be re-elected. Mr. Lee described Mitt Romney's Mormon religion as the "big question" of the campaign.

Illustration, by Drew Friedman

“I’m loving it,” said Roseanne Barr, recently announced presidential candidate. “I find that I can be more honest in politics than in Hollywood.”

Not that she’s ever been accused of demurring in either realm.

Seeking to run on the Green Party line, Ms. Barr’s presidential bid, she said, is primarily motivated by her dissatisfaction with both major political parties—in particular their candidates, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama, whom she referred to as “total buffoons.”

“That’s what I say: I’m the only serious comedian in this race,” Ms. Barr added.

In a career spanning more than 40 years, including rollicking standup performances, a watershed sitcom and a memorable performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” Ms. Barr has been at turns provocative, endearing, innovative and combative. As of February, she has turned her considerable personality toward the interests of the American electorate. In a pair of lengthy interviews with The Observer, she outlined not only her political aspirations, but the possibility of returning to television—and not necessarily in the way you would expect.

“I feel sorry for the American people who’ve been hoodwinked by both of these parties of nothing but criminals that sit in Congress there enriching themselves,” she began.

As it happens, legalization of marijuana is the first issue in the political platform posted on Ms. Barr’s website. She said she has a prescription to use the drug for glaucoma in California and vowed to smoke a joint at a public press conference if she is victorious in the Golden State’s Green Party primary this week.

“I don’t really smoke it, but I have a salve of it, you know, and if you rub it into your wrists, you don’t get high,” Ms. Barr said. “You’re not getting high but you feel release. I have salve and I have cookies.”

Other issues on Ms. Barr’s platform include ending the Federal Reserve, stopping “debt slavery” by “forgiving all school loans,” withdrawing military support for Israel and making war “obsolete.”

“Wars make the stock market go up and are fueled by profits. Where one puts their money is where one puts their energy,” Ms. Barr explains on her site. “The Military Industrial Complex is our shadow government.”

She also is concerned about preserving the environment, particularly water resources.

“Those that lead us have allowed the corporations to cross over the web of life and they have destroyed the genetic code,” she wrote. “They have befouled our food and water supply.”

She describes her economic policy—if that’s the right word—as a synthesis of free enterprise and the social safety net.

“We can have a really great world. We can have a world that was at peace and was prosperous and efficient and just ... I just think, wow. I think we’re really in that cosmic space where we can actually command our group will to make something change very quickly. I think we’re just so on the verge of that,” Ms. Barr said. “I just like to encourage people to jump off, man. Jump off and start thinking clearly.”

Cookies, indeed.

Another point Ms. Barr emphasized is that being a woman makes her a more insightful leader.

“This is a post-patriarchal age, and that’s what I represent; it’s a return to actual values of the Earth like growing food that we can eat. Not tomatoes made of fish skin,” Ms. Barr said. “We know how to get things done and we know how to get them done cheaply and efficiently.”

The problem with that notion, however, is that Ms. Barr’s main opponent, and the favorite for the Green Party nomination, is also a woman, Dr. Jill Stein, an academic and environmental activist who has been representing the Green Party in political campaigns at the local level since 2002, when she ran (against Romney) for governor of Massachusetts. Though Ms. Barr says she agrees on many things with Dr. Stein, she believes she is the better candidate—and took a shot at her opponent from the left, or at least from left field.

“I think I have far more to say than she does,” Ms. Barr said of Dr. Stein. “Some of the things that I say, they’re not out of a book and they’re not out of the party bible.”

For her part, Dr. Stein, declined to comment.

“They’re resisting me and the message that I’m bringing in a big way,” Mr. Barr doubled down. “To ask working people to show up and then go get their ballot notarized is nothing but voter suppression. That’s making me very angry, and I really beseech the Greens to be who they say they are and get their act together.”

Based on the most recent numbers provided by the Green Party, Dr. Stein is currently leading the race for the nomination with 143 party delegates compared to Ms. Barr’s 40. There are two other candidates, Kent Mesplay, who has 7.5 delegates, and Harvey Mikkelson, who has won just 1.5 delegates.

“I don’t know what the outcome will be. I know it’s a possibility that I could receive 99 percent of the vote. I also know that it’s a probability that I will not,” Ms. Barr admitted. “I’m just trying to encourage people to look at the whole picture, the whole big picture, and I want to bring up subject matter that isn’t covered in other presidential platforms.”

Should she not make it to the White House, she is more than willing to return to her day job—or at least to her job playing someone with a day job. During the final two years of her career as a the star of her eponymous show, Roseanne, Ms. Barr ranked as the second-highest-paid woman in showbiz (behind only Oprah Winfrey). The sitcom ran on ABC from 1988 until 1997 and, for its first seven seasons, held a spot in the top 10 on the Nielsen ratings charts. That’s a bankability the networks don’t soon forget

And though she’s done a couple of short-lived reality shows, including one entitled Roseanne’s Nuts, she may soon be reprising the form that made her career. Her latest effort is another sitcom, a pilot called Downwardly Mobile, in which she portrays the owner of a trailer park whose denizens include a “young Hispanic boy” adopted by the residents after his mother was deported and “a Wall Street couple that lost all their money.”

“It was about cooperation rather than competition, the key values that I hold dear and America needs,” Ms. Barr said emphatically. “I just wanted the American people to once again see themselves as heroic on television.”

Downwardly Mobile, which Ms. Barr wrote and executive produced, would reunite her with John Goodman, her husband on Roseanne. She says she “patterned each character” after the family she and Mr. Goodman headed on her successful sitcom. NBC picked up the pilot for Downwardly Mobile last fall, but according to Ms. Barr, the show was initially shelved because of her outspoken political views.

To hear her tell it, Downwardly Mobile tested well in California, but days before it was scheduled to be shown to audiences in New York, the conservative entertainment website Big Hollywood published an article based on leaked reports the show was testing poorly due to Ms. Barr being a “leftist.” Ms. Barr complained to NBC about the reported leak.

“I got really mad and I said, ‘Why would you release that information?’ And I was told, ‘We didn’t, that’s just a fake website,” she said. “Well, it turned out to be completely true.”

Once the show tested with audiences in New York, Ms. Barr says she was told it wouldn’t be picked up because network executives deemed it too “polarizing.”

“How they figure what is polarizing is blows my mind. It really has blown my mind,” she said. “I guess it went back to the sponsors on the East Coast and some of them are—they don’t like me no matter what I do and they don’t like the things I say, so it’s kind of like blacklisting or something. But the fact is that I still think it’s weird to blacklist, or whatever you want to call it, in Hollywood, someone who has a huge—whose show had a huge audience and still does after 20-something years.”

Downwardly Mobile may have foundered at first, but the pilot is apparently still alive, despite Ms. Barr’s fears of being blacklisted. During our first conversation with Ms. Barr, she said the show had been killed. When we spoke a few hours later, she told us NBC was giving it another chance as a potential midseason replacement.

“The Downwardly Mobile thing, I just kind of heard that it’s not completely dead,” said Ms. Barr. “Since I talked to you I got a phone call and I might be getting a chance to retool it, which I hope and pray I would get.”

But in her own estimation, even her television career has been a political effort, in many ways.

“I really hate to toot my own horn, but since I’m a woman I feel I have to,” she told The Observer. “I not only pushed the boundaries, I introduced the subject of gay characters on television,” said Ms. Barr, whose brother and sister are both gay. “That was at great peril to my own career and against all of my advisors. I brought the whole issue of gay to television.”

And just as her television career was politicized, she plans to bring her political career to the screen.

“I am making a movie of my campaign. I’m making a documentary of it for many reasons, and it is funny,” she said. “I am using the crew and the team of my friend Michael Moore, and I am documenting running for president and how hard it is.”

There’s another area of the political realm Ms. Barr says she could potentially get involved with—cable news punditry. Despite her obviously liberal leanings, Ms. Barr says she’d be interested in doing a show with Fox News.

“They’ve always been so fair and nice to me at Fox,” she elaborated. “I just don’t like Fox when it doesn’t get the complete fair and balance, but I do think they do try to, even though some of the people like Sean Hannity and stuff, the things they attack are just ridiculous. But yet, they have the right to do that. You can’t discount that people have the right to freedom of speech. I told Fox I’d sure like to have a show on there, because the people who watch Fox News are people like me also. So, it would be good to be really fair and balanced and have a nice left point of view on there.”

Ms. Barr told us she has been in talks with the network and, at one point, Fox News was ready to give her a show.

“They do talk to me about it … We’ve had beers and laughed about it and stuff. Offers have been made and I just didn’t get on with it because I was trying to just do that sitcom,” Ms. Barr said. “It could happen. Stranger things have happened. It could happen definitely.”

hwalker@observer.com