This clip has already been almost everywhere today, but in the interest of Leno-bashing completeness, I feel like we should post it here as well. In it, Letterman and guest Howard Stern discuss the late night wars, and Dave’s complicated relationship with his nemesis. It’s clear neither guy cares too much for Leno, but Letterman does his best to try to remain as diplomatic as he can possibly be considering Leno screwed him out of his dream job and then proceeded to mail said job in for years. Which is to say, he does a funny impression of Jay and high-fives Stern when the newest “America Got Talent” host says he refuses to do “The Tonight Show” even though he’s an NBC employee now. Quite a bit of restraint, all things considered.

One other item of note: I don’t know if you guys have noticed, but sometimes when I do the What’s On Tonight post, I swap out Leno’s name with ones like “Butthead McGoo” or “Chins McFartypants.” This is admittedly not very nice, but then again, neither is going to disturbing lengths to hose two much funnier and more passionate people out a show they both had a pretty good claim to at the time. Turnabout is fair play, Mr. Fartypants.

If you take Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert out of the equation, then the answer to the above question is probably yes. Over on the the AV Club, ahead of Jimmy Fallon’s third-year anniversary, Steven Hyden has come around to what I’ve been saying elsewhere since Fallon became the only network talk show host to come out of the Leno/Conan controversy unscathed.

Fallon’s transformation from widely derided lightweight—a man assumed to have secret knowledge of where Lorne Michaels keeps the bodies buried in order to continue getting such good jobs—to heir apparent to the King Of Late Night crown is complete and shocking. Jimmy Fallon is now so likeable that it’s actually a cliché to point out how likeable he is. Not only has he become the opposite of what he used to be, he’s made thinking otherwise seem mean-spirited. He is the puppy-basket of late-night talk-show hosts.

Hyden continues on to say that Fallon “has the brightest future of any late-night host.” I don’t disagree. As someone who grew up on Dave, disliked Fallon on “SNL” and hated his short-lived movie career, it took me a while to warm up to him, but now if I bother to watch any of the late night network talk shows at all, it’s always Fallon.

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“Hey, did you hear about this? This is in the news: the Supreme Leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-il, passed away on Saturday. Yup, yup, it’s true. They say he SMALL JOKE while WEARING SUNGLASSES, and it’s rumored that AMERICAN POP CULTURE CELEBRITY will take over.”

I hate late night monologues. Just everything about them: the set-up, the formula, the body swaying to indicate an “I’m just joking” demeanor, the conversational asides in the middle of the joke, the repetition of certain words and names, and most of all, the oh-so-topical punchlines. I don’t usually watch “Letterman” or “Kimmel” or even “Conan,” simply because I can’t stand the first 10 minutes of every show (I also don’t watch the other 50 when it comes to “Leno.”) The text above, that’s pretty much the route every late-night host took to tell their Kim Jong-il’s dead joke(s) last night. But can you match the joke with said host? No cheating! Here’s the first, with the other three — as well as the answers— after the jump.

Well, in North Korea, they announced the passing of their supreme leader Kim Jong-il, and his younger son will take over. At first, there was speculation that power could be passed down to Kim’s two sisters, Kourtney Jong-il and Khloe Jong-il…And Michele Bachmann, foreign affairs not her strong suit, when she was told of the Supreme Leader’s death, she said, “I didn’t even know Diana Ross was sick.” And Rick Perry, y’know, Rick Perry, Rick Perry didn’t fare much better. When he was told about Kim Jong-il, he said, “I never heard of him. Then again, I don’t listen to that rap music.”

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I say this, and I don’t say it lightly: Jay Leno is Satan, or at least made in Satan’s image. Leno is not for people who want to turn their brains off after a long day of work; Leno is for people biologically incapable of turning their brain on. Show me a Leno fan, and I’ll show you incontrovertible proof that there’s no such thing as evolution. He is a soft-brained meatsack, late-night comedic sludge. He is to comedy what DRANO is to an esophagus. And after 17 years, David Letterman has finally beaten him during a sweeps month.

In the November sweep, CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman” beat NBC’s “Tonight Show with Jay Leno” among adults 18 to 49 for the first time since 1994, according to Nielsen. Letterman scored a 0.9 rating over Leno’s 0.8. (Source: LA Times)

Look: I grew up on Letterman. Letterman was a childhood hero of mine, but I admit I don’t pay much attention to his show anymore, not since the affair with his underlings knocked him off the pedestal upon which I held him. But he’s still ten times the talk-show host that Leno is, and as Leno’s ratings continue to fall, NBC will finally rue the day they screwed over Conan O’Brien. This is a small victory but it’s a victory for humanity, for comedy, and for common decency. The fact that “The Daily Show” (0.7) lags behind both shows, however, is criminal, and more evidence that Nielsen boxes were designed by Satan’s minions.

Yesterday I posted the baffling Hermain Cain ad that featured chief of staff Mark Block taking a drag from a cigarette and Cain breaking into a slow, creepy smile. It was obviously ripe for parody, and late-night hosts went after it with gusto. Conan O’Brien, David Letterman, and Stephen Colbert all created similar spoofs of the commercial. (I’m sure Jay Leno will tackle it some time early next year.)

Not only have I embedded the videos below, but I’ve also ranked them because I enjoy stirring up pointless discussion. For further reading on this matter, please see my defining work in the genre, EMILY > ZOOEY.

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