Topical humor


"How about that Senator Barack Obama? You know what he's doing? He's going door to door, knocking on doors, and it's fascinating. It's kind of like a throw-back. I don't know if he changed any votes, but today he came home with a big bag full of Halloween candy. How about that? But it was a little embarrassing when he rang a doorbell at two of McCain's houses." --David Letterman

"The third presidential debate took place in our neck of the woods, out on Long Island. ... I watched the debate, and, honestly, there was no question, no question who looked more presidential. Bob Schieffer." --David Letterman

"But here, I mean, they're going right down to the wire here. You've got Barack Obama and you've got John McCain. And oh, my God, what a soap opera, what a soap opera this has become. I mean, it's the 'Old and the Restless.'" --David Letterman

"Did you notice how energetic and aggressive John McCain was during the debate? I think somebody added Red Bull to his Mylanta." --David Letterman

"Every debate's had one of these, where there's kind of an embarrassing moment, one of the candidates got confused. It happened again earlier tonight, John McCain, they're sitting at desks. That was the new breakthrough for this debate, sitting at desks. And John McCain kept asking about a senior discount on the grand slam breakfast." --David Letterman

"I don't want to say John McCain is old, but he's the only guy who fantasizes about Cloris Leachman on 'Dancing with the Stars.'" --David Letterman

"How about that Sarah Palin? Do you like Sarah Palin? She's exciting. She's interesting, isn't she? And she was at the debate, and she was blinking McCain's answers in code." --David Letterman

"You know, that's what people are saying, they're saying that Sarah Palin is transmitting, every time she blinks, it's some sort of coded message that she's transferring over the television to the public. I remember the same thing, Hillary Clinton, same thing. Do you remember that? She used to actually -- this is true -- she used to send coded messages by opening and closing her pantsuit." --David Letterman

"Ladies and gentlemen, I got an update on Vice President Dick Cheney. He was admitted to a hospital earlier today, abnormal heart rhythm. But he's doing fine. He's okay. He's already sitting up, sneering at nurses. And he'll be out shooting hunting buddies again soon." --David Letterman

Earlier this evening, the third presidential debate was held. And this is interesting, Hillary Clinton was sitting in the audience. Did you know that? Yeah. Yeah, in fact, when John McCain was attacking Barack Obama, you could hear Hillary yelling, 'Get him!'" --Conan O'Brien

"Sarah Palin had her motorcade stop at a Wal-Mart so she could buy a bag of diapers. That's true. Yeah. Palin said she wouldn't have made the stop for diapers, but John McCain's completely out." --Conan O'Brien

"Josh Brolin, who plays President Bush in the new movie 'W,' says at first, he wasn't sure he should take the role, because it would be such an acting challenge. That's what he said. Brolin says he prepared for the role by getting up every day, running five miles, and then bashing himself in the head with a hammer." --Conan O'Brien

"Hillary Clinton said on Fox News there's no chance of her running for president again -- this year." --Jay Leno

"You know, an article in the Washington Post today said that some medical experts believe Joe Biden may have had Botox. In fact, you know how they could tell? His expression didn't change when they asked him about his hair plugs." --Jay Leno

"Oh, he's not the only one, yeah. Now they're accusing John McCain of being pumped full of formaldehyde." --Jay Leno

"Barack Obama unveiled his economic plan this week. Obama said the one word in everybody's mind, and that word is j-o-b-s. Immediately afterwards, President Bush accused Barack of talking in some kind of secret code." --Jay Leno

"Barack Obama continues to lead in the polls. Barack said, today, if it wasn't for Fox News, he might be up two or three more points in the polls. So apparently, five of the six news channel openly rooting for him isn't enough. You gotta get that last one." --Jay Leno

"Well, the market went down over 700 points today. Oh, that reminds me. You know, we turn our clocks back soon. We're turning it back to 1929, I believe." --Jay Leno

"Hey, look, I don't want to say the stock market is unstable, but this morning, the opening bell was rung by Paula Abdul." --Jay Leno

"And they gave out the Nobel Prize for economics this week. Interesting. It went to a highly intelligent economist. His theory is a little hard, I think, for the average person to comprehend. I'm going to break it down. This is his theory. He determined that it was bad business to give loans to people who can't pay them back! Apparently, we don't understand that in this country." --Jay Leno

"Vice President Dick Cheney was treated today for an irregular heartbeat. His doctors aren't sure what caused it. They figured it was either stress or the sudden drop in oil prices." --Jay Leno

"Actually, doctors shocked his heart back into a normal rhythm after it lost rhythm. Losing rhythm. See, that's when you know you're really, really a white guy. When you lose so much rhythm, you need hospitalization." --Jay Leno

"This is not your typical debate. Anheuser-Busch, the beer company, underwrote it. They paid for everything, which is a little bit odd, because Cindy McCain, as you may know, owns an Anheuser-Busch wholesaler in Arizona, and also because it's just weird to have alcohol play such a major role in a presidential debate. I don't know much about running for president, but it seems to me that John McCain is not spending nearly enough time working the 'my wife can get us free beer' angle." --Jimmy Kimmel

"Meanwhile, this is kind of a cute thing. Sarah Palin had to have her campaign bus make an unscheduled stop at a Wal-Mart in Ohio, so she could pick up a package of diapers. I guess she ran out of diapers, so they pulled over and she went in and everyone followed her. Which is kind of cute, but it turned out Senator McCain didn't need them." --Jimmy Kimmel

"All the cable news channels were buzzing about what we could expect to happen at the debate. This morning on CNN, Kyra Phillips was introducing her expert analysts, and well, see if you catch the very subtle Freudian slip [on screen: Phillips introduces Republican strategist Leslie Sanchez as a CNN contributor, but it sounds like she says the word c**t twice before spitting out 'contributor']. It's cable, you can say whatever you want." --Jimmy Kimmel

"This is an interesting. Scholastic, the company [that] used to sell books when we were in school. They polled 250,000 American school kids and that they asked who they liked for president. Overwhelmingly, they picked Barack Obama over John McCain. And not only did McCain finish behind Obama, he also finished well behind Batman, the Wiggles and Dora the Explorer. So, you know, a poll like this may seem to be trivial, but believe it or not, this is true, it has correctly predicted who is the president will be every election year since 1960." --Jimmy Kimmel

"As we speak, Barack Obama and John McCain have just finished their third and final debate. Now, in the latest New York Times poll, McCain trails by 14 points. So it is clear what this debate needed to be for him [on screen: people saying McCain needs a game-changer in the final debate]. Hopefully he can change that game to golf. That way the lowest score wins." -Stephen Colbert

"But I personally [am] not worried about John McCain. The Lord is on his side. After all, John McCain's led a very Biblical life. Like his namesake Cain, he is not afraid to go negative on a brother. Like John the Baptist, he paved the way for the new Messiah [on screen: photo of Sarah Palin], and like Moses, he takes advice from a Bush who is going up in flames." --Stephen Colbert