We tend to steer clear of politics around these parts.  Ted Johnson does a fine job of rounding it all up for us over at Wilshire and Washington, but this one-liner from John Bowman in an AP story on returning late night talk shows made me laugh out loud:

"Huckabee claims he didn't know ['The Tonight Show' didn't have a WGA waiver],” chief union negotiator John Bowman said.  "I don’t know what that means in terms of trusting him as a future president."

Yes, the talk shows came back last night, though no Oscar hopefuls were in sight.  Politics was higher on the agenda, as Hilary Clinton taped an intro for Letterman while Mike Hucakbee, as mentioned, took to Jay Leno's stage.

Lots of strike jokes, some inspired, many lame and derivative.  Letterman's "Top 10 List of Writers' Demands" was capped with a hardy-har "Producers should immediately remove their heads from their asses," while Leno took some questions from his audience in the absence of writers, which was actually quite effective and refreshingly out of the ordinary, even if necessarily so.

Letterman mentioned that the prospect of awards show cancellations in the wake of the strike was "something good" to have come of all of this.  An easy target, but there we are.  Leno, meanwhile: "For those of you who don't know, the awards season here in Hollywood lasts from January 1st through December 31st every year."

Letterman and Conan O'Brien (who floundered considerably) sported beards and Leno wrote his own jokes for the monologue.

Ellen Page lands at Letterman tomorrow night for a key "Juno" appearance.