It's pretty priceless to watch Nikpour — ex-proprietor of a "racy website" and defender of schoolchildren against homosexual "techniques" — tell Sam Bee with a straight face that the Christmas ornaments the White House sent to schoolchildren for decoration were a way of "infiltrating them" with socialism. But even better is the way the kids themselves react when Bee tries this socialist-infiltration language — and, for good measure, the birther conspiracy theory — out on them. Their responses start with "do you think before you speak?" and get better from there. Glenn Beck would be no match for them.

December 16, 2009: Obama's Socialist Christmas Ornament Program [Comedy Central]

Gwen Ifill [The Daily Show with Jon Stewart]

The Daily Show has historically gotten a lot of mileage out of Fox & Friends' Gretchen Carlson's "troubled mom" persona, which basically involves wrinkling her nose and innocently wondering what this Obama fellow is up to with our country.

Stewart employs Carlson's own hard-hitting research tactics (Google!) to learn that she may not be as simple and hair-twirling as she lets on. Dumbing yourself down is bad enough when it's to work an audience into a populist frenzy. But disingenuously playing into gendered soccer mom, gee whiz cliches? Evil brilliance.

Earlier Fox News Host Screens Next Generation Of Miss Americas

The architect of the "Death Panels" idea, McCaughey didn't miss a beat when Daily Show host Jon Stewart pointed out the text of the bill mandates "life-sustaining" procedures - which seems a bit far from a death panel.

Instead, McCaughey ducked the actual language of the bill and continued to push her agenda, which includes telling seniors that the cuts to Medicare means they will no longer be able to get hip replacements and bypass surgery.

Around seven minutes in, Jon finally lost his patience, as did most of the audience. (You can watch the unedited, entire interview here and here.)

Our best fake newscaster hit the nail over the head again and again. There are legitimate things to be discussed about this health care plan and what it actually does and does not grant. But time and time again, the people who get the most airtime and have the most to say about health care are not the people who are the best informed - instead the focus falls to people like Betsy McCaughey, who is so serious about her message being delivered that she walked onto the show with the first half of the health care bill in a binder with no markings, tabs, or post-it notes to access certain sections. She won't acknowledge that she may have gotten her facts mixed up or that she may be making leaps of logic that have no actual basis in legislation. She doesn't acknowledge that some of the issues she is against were actually in the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act (MMA) of 2003.

Instead, McCaughey, like the Dark Ex-Governor during the Vice Presidential debates, focused on winning over the crowd, not producing any factual basis for her claims. She smiled and searched the audience for support. She said cute things about Jon Stewart and made it seem like they were two friends in on a big joke, just like Palin did during the Vice Presidential debates. And she actively pandered for sympathy from the crowd, in the same way we have seen Palin do in so many of her public appearances.

It's the Palin model for public discourse.

And it is going to be the death of intelligent political discussion.

Exclusive - Betsy McCaughey Extended Interview Pt. 1 [The Daily Show]
FACT CHECK: No 'Death Panel' in Health Care Bill [The Caucus]
The New Medicare Prescription Drug Law [BNET]

Related: I Was Wrong [James Fallows]

"To be honest," Tim told Jon, "it was too painful for me to watch it." Jon replied: "It sucked."

Bonus clip: Tim Gunn talks about the comic book version of himself!

Last night's segment on the Daily Show between Jon Stewart and Larry Wilmore was chock full of lots of quotables like:

"White people had a good run, but it's over!"

"All men are created equal - how'd you think that would end?"

"This is what happens when you have a melting pot, the stew gets darker."

I chuckled along until the very end - when Wilmore told Jon to buck up - after all, he gets to say "That's Racist!" now. That joke in particular struck a sour note with me - while I could get the coy reference to other terms, I still can't get over the fact that so many people seem to think pointing out racism is some kind of gotcha strategy, akin to a game or a sport.

The Daily Show [Comedy Central]

Bee and Jones live with two-year-old Piper and seven-month-old Fletcher in a Manhattan one-bedroom. Despite being a woman who "was never the kind of person who would make googly eyes at other people's babies, ever," Bee's take on parenting seems relaxed and down-to-earth.

On space:

Four people and a cat. Don't forget the cat. I know. It's insane. Jason and I are just lucky that we have an office that we share so we can have sex at work. [Laughs.] We were in a two-bedroom for a while when we just had our daughter, but we didn't use the second bedroom at all. We all slept in the same room anyway. Jason and I kind of like having our children in the same room with us at night. We like knowing where they are at all times and we're lucky that we like it. We would go crazy if we didn't...We're hippies at heart and the truth is, we enjoy each other's company. We're very very lucky we like each other, because we work together A LOT in small spaces.

On nursing: "I breastfeed my children until they can ask for it by name. I don't get too worried about the minutiae and I just go with my instincts. That's working for us so far."

On TDS: "The Daily Show has been amazing, because they are so relaxed about bringing our children to work. We bring our kids to work all the time."

On child actors: "I hope to God that they don't go into the performing arts. I pray for all of our sakes, because when I'm old, I would like to be put up in a good-quality nursing home and they won't be able to afford it if they go into theater...Children already feel like they're the center of the universe. They don't need a whole network of people encouraging that on top of what they already feel."

Samantha Bee [Babble]

In the clip at left, Jon shows how his son, Nathan, tries to make secret plans with dad during his little sister's nap time, and explains that little Nathan is going to grow up thinking it's normal to sit with The View's Whoopi Goldberg at Knicks games.

In some ways, not much has changed since Jon took over from Craig Kilborn on January 11, 1999. In his first show, Jon gives and editorial on the topic of "change" and covers congressional proceedings about a Clinton, though Bill's trial was much sexier than Hillary's confirmation hearing earlier this week. It's clear that years of mocking Fox News and George W. Bush have taken a toll on Jon, but he was, and still is, the thinking woman's ultimate fake news crush. [Comedy Central Insider]

Stewart was all, "I make you nervous? You just made my life." The two went on to discuss crappy movies — Craig admitted that he used to go into Blockbuster and throw his bad movies under the shelf. Later, the talk turned to hanging out at shooting galleries, and at the very end of the interview, Stewart asked, "Are you planning on continued handsomeness?" and the man known as James Bond blushed. Priceless! Clip at left.

Earlier: As The Obama Transition Begins, So Does The Kiss And Tell On Palin

Community Organizers [The Daily Show]

Barack Obama [Daily Show]