popslant  has never had much of a problem with Jay Leno. We know that talk show hosts and comedians make their nut on jokes about everybody, but the recent partisan turn of Jay on the occasion of political conventions have given us pause.

On Wednesday, his cracks about the ethnic make-up about he RNC audience have led us to believe that since he will soon be losing his job, he is making a partisan attack on the heartland conservatives.

Sorry Jay. We won't employ you either. Good luck making wise-cracks to the homeless. Of course, we know you're such a penny-pincher that you'll never be homeless, but at least you can save enormous chin-dominated face with your liberal friends.

Oprah Winfrey is apparently is "balking" at the idea of having Sarah Palin on her show. Despite a large volume of e-mails asking for Palin to be a guest, it seems Oprah is resisting the idea, even against the advice of her aides.

The assumption that many are making is that she is against the idea because of her admiration and support of Barack Obama. After campaigning for Obama, why in the world would she help to promote his opponent? This is the danger of being involved in the supposedly non-partisan, watered-down, self-help infommercial known as the Oprah empire, and declaring support for a political candidate.

popslant  doesn't believe it is just political partisanship, though. We suspect the manin reason that Oprah doesn't want to feature Sarah Palin is that Sarah Palin would overshadow her. Even Oprah on her pulpit feels threatened by the newest popular woman on the scene, especially when that woman is strong, confident, and invalidates the "woman-as-a-victim" tripe she has been peddling for so long.

The Emperor wears no clothes.

Late night TV is usually thought of as being dominated by Jay Leno, Davis Letterman or Conan O'Brien. Of course, to those in the know, the best late night host in the business is none other than TV's Craig Ferguson. While the others engage in the same safe and droll patter night after night, Ferguson is an impassioned newly naturalized U.S. citizen who is not shy about standing up for what he believes in. And he is consistently funnier than all the others combined.

Take for example his interview a few years ago with Bill Maher. When Maher said on his show it was less devastating for a child to be molested by Michael Jackson than to be beaten up by a peer, Ferguson ended the interview and sent him packing. Of course we couldn't applaud that action more, as Maher is a big-mouthed, foul little man with a TV talk show in his hand.

Ferguuson's passion was at the forefront last night, when he excoriated those who complain about their situation in this country but don't follow politics or bother to vote. As a new citizen to this country, his love for democracy far outweighs many of those who were born here and take it for granted.

Craig, we salute you!

You would think that having the whole summer off would give you some time to come up with some spectacular ideas to kick off a new season of a popular TV show... Not so for the cast and writers of Saturday Night Live. Once one of the funniest shows on television, SNL is wallowing in the dregs of banality. Last night's season premiere was one of the worst SNL shows ever. I feel bad for Michael Phelps, who came off some spectacular Olympic achievements and landed in the heap of dung that was last night's show.

Of course, the season kicked off with some digs at Republicans, as Tina Fey made a cameo as Sarah Palin in the show's opening segment. It's ironic that the treatment of Sarah Palin by Fey, in which Fey portrayed her as a bubble-headed wing nut, showed Fey to be a bubble-headed wing nut herself. Such simplistic criticisms of our future Vice President reveal more about Fey than Palin.

Surprisingly, the show went downhill from there. Stupid character driven gag followed stupid character driven gag, with the few moments of brightness soon smothered by a miasma of uninspired drivel. I'm sure Michael Phelps did the best he could not to be embarrased by this show. As an athlete he cannot be expected to pull the show up to a higher level; that's the cast's job. And in this, they failed miserably. You may wonder whether they were trying to tone down their abilities as comedians to allow Phelps to stand out among them, but that's obviously not the case.

popslant  feels bad for Guy Fieri, the Food Network host, who was in the front row of the audience. You score some front row tickets for SNL, then they perform this miserably? Should've stuck with Plan B, dude. You could have been having some wings at TGI Fridays with some friends and had a more entertaining time.

As for the musical guest, Lil Wayne equals Little Talent. Are you kidding me? popslant  found listening to Lil Wayne's gratuitous, off key bellowing to be more excruciating than having one's fingernails pulled out. How does this crap warrant an appearance on SNL, let alone on any network TV program? From the moment he uttered the oh so original exultation to "let me see your hands," I knew that he was just another in a continuing line of no-talent rappers who think being able to string together couplets constitutes some higher art form. Give me a break.

So another dismal season of SNL gets underway, and once again, there's another reason to go out on Saturday and leave the TV off.

David Letterman is in a snit because John McCain cancelled on him the other day. Boo freakin' hoo.

Letterman used to matter, but now he is the least of the talk show hosts. Remember in the seventies, when the progressive rock group Boston put out the same record twice? Letterman has put out the same show, night after night, thousands of times. He just doesn't matter anymore.

Get over yourself and retire already.