* Perhaps taking a cue from her most rogueish guest, Oprah Winfrey has decided she will no longer be shackled behind her talk show.

* The Senate takes up its version of the health care bill tomorrow morning. Harry Reid needs 60 votes just to proceed with debate, because the Republicans do not want to deal with this thing at all. If they filibuster, let us hope they forgo the phonebooks and pledge allegiance to the flag for twelve hours straight. (Eat your heart out, Todd Akin!)

* Said health care bill is 2,074 pages long. Tony Perkins and his fightin' evangelicals have released something called "The Manhattan Declaration," which manages to cover "the sanctity of life, traditional marriage and religious liberty" in just 4,700 words.

* President Obama will make a decision about Afghanistan troop levels after Thanksgiving, assuming he's not in a food coma.

According to the newly released Senate healthcare bill, Democrats want to pay for reform by taxing so-called "Cadillac insurance plans." Which sounds good, until you remember GM filed for bankruptcy this year. "Cadillac" doesn't exactly mean what it used to. In fact, I'm pretty sure this means they're paying for healthcare reform by taxing Medicaid. Either way, Stephen Colbert has a fool-proof plan to protect his money from the socialist taxocrats.

The Colbert Report airs Monday through Thursday at 11:30pm / 10:30c.

Were you wondering how Senate Republicans were planning to respond to Harry Reid's never-ever-in-a-million-years-gonna-pass proposed health care bill?

Were you really? You probably shouldn't have been wondering…

Republicans, who have criticized the Democrats' initiative as a step toward government control of the healthcare system, are already planning a series of delaying tactics, including forcing the entire bill to be read aloud on the Senate floor.

"It's going to be a holy war," Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) said Wednesday evening.

All right! A good ol' fashioned holy war, just like they used to do it in the olden days. I'ma go grab my filabustin' stick!

You love Lou Dobbs so much. He's your favorite, and you've been simply beside yourself since he abruptly left CNN. You've tried recreating the show at home using makeshift puppets, but the puppets were frankly too coherent for it to be believable. No, it seems only the man himself can fill the Lou Dobbs-shaped hole in your TV. Fortunately, he was on The Daily Show last night. And if that still didn't satisfying your Dobbsian hunger, we now have an extended and uncensored version of the interview.

The interview continues below.

The Daily Show airs Monday through Thursday at 11pm / 10c.

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Yesterday Harry Reid emerged from the Senate with a 2,074-page health care bill, which covers everything from Sarah's family life in Alaska to her conflicts with the McCain campaign in- oh, sorry, reflex.

Anyway, the Senate has a health care bill, it runs 2,074 pages, and that is a source of great consternation. Why is this bill so long? Look at it! Why does it have all those words and numbers? Can't they just overhaul the American health care system with a Facebook note, like normal people? What outrageous things are the Democrats trying to hide with their writing and publishing?

How about this?

To raise money for the health overhaul, Democrats are proposing a new 5% tax on elective cosmetic procedures. The tax was a surprise addition to the sweeping 2,074-page bill that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid unveiled late Wednesday. It generates $5 billion over a decade for the plan, which is expected to cost $849 billion over a decade.

The tax would fall on the individuals who undergo the procedures. If they don't pay it when they’re billed for their surgery, then it falls to the provider who performed the procedure.

Outrage-o-meter says… 3. Maybe 4, max. Fun fact: since 2004, New Jersey has been the only state with its own cosmetic surgery tax law on the books.

Yet if you've ever gone down the shore in July, you'll notice that it's had zero impact in terms of putting bureaucracy, or even common sense, between patients and their plastic surgeons.

^{Aww, NJ, you know I love you. Next time I'm in Belmar, the pork roll-egg-and-cheese is on me.}

Last night, Joe Biden made his first appearance on The Daily Show since being elected Vice President of these United States of A, and I have to say I was thoroughly disappointed. The interview lasted 14 minutes and there weren't any of the hilarious gaffes I've come to expect from the Veep. He didn't call Khalid Sheikh Mohammed "a pretty okay guy once you get to know him." He didn't accidentally blurt out missile codes. Hell, it didn't even look like his shoelaces were tied together. What a let down.

The interview continues below.

The Daily Show airs Monday through Thursday at 11pm / 10c.

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