Chafee thanks comedian O’Brien for unsolicited campaign song, offers to go on comic’s show

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Democratic presidential hopeful Lincoln Chafee thanked comedian Conan O’Brien on Thursday, after the late-night talk show host came up with an unsolicited song for Chafee’s longshot campaign.

O’Brien said on his Wednesday TBS show he wanted to raise the former Rhode Island governor’s poll numbers from 0 per cent to 1 per cent because “it seems like the nice thing to do.” Musicians Aimee Mann and Ted Leo wrote and performed a song, set to the tune of the Fine Young Cannibals’ “She Drives Me Crazy.”

“You don’t have to vote for him, just get him to 1 per cent,” they sang. Of Chafee’s push for the metric system, they sang it has “zero grams chance of success.”

“I want to thank Conan for the attention,” Chafee wrote in a statement released by his spokeswoman. “He’s a good sport and I would definitely come on the show to help his ratings.”