Appearing on The Late Show with David Letterman last night, Arizona Senator John McCain nervously squirmed as the late night host asked him questions about the state of the Republican Party.

David Letterman was feeling a little Christmas-y on Thursday night’s Late Show, sending out a Tweet from his desk to his fellow talk-show hosts, wishing them a Merry Christmas and suggesting they all buy a zoo together:

As frontrunner Newt Gingrich‘s poll numbers descend from their former lunar colony heights, slow-and-steady GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney is poised to capitalize on his rival’s stumble. In a shrewd move, with shrewd timing, the former Massachusetts Governor appeared on The Late Show Monday night to deliver host David Letterman‘s Top Ten List. Romney’s performance was characteristically wooden, but achieved the desired humanizing effect, and distilled at least one essential truth.

In an interview with David Letterman, film star Tom Hanks announced he was planning on releasing a brand new HBO miniseries.

Since he last held a sustained lead in the Republican primary polls, way back in the summertime, there hasn’t been a whole lot of good news for establishment candidate Mitt Romney. However, according to Politico‘s Patrick Gavin, there is one area in which Romney is defeating his rivals handily. Gavin reports that the former Massachusetts Gov. is head-and-shoulders above the competition when it comes to mentions by late-night comics. Current frontrunner Newt Gingrich is running a distant 5th.

Last night, Herman Cain paid a visit to David Letterman‘s Late Show, where talk eventually turned to his “9-9-9 plan.”

Letterman admitted he doesn’t quite understand what the plan is all about… right before informing Cain that “you don’t even know what it means:”

Regis Philbin‘s will take a bow on his last show Friday morning, but, before leaving, he paid old friend David Letterman a visit on Thursday night, discussing he kiss they shared on air a day earlier and having the Top Ten list dedicated to him. As a parting gift, Letterman mounted Regis on a new red vespa scooter, and encouraged him to ride off into the sunset on it. One problem: Regis had never driven one before. He accelerated, wobbled, then tumbled the mini-motorcycle, eventually jumping off just in time to avoid a nasty and untimely accident.

Yesterday morning, Bill Maher appeared on the set of The View and instead of a convivial discussion about the topics of the day or a promotion of whatever book he was trying to sell, co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck confronted the provocateur over what she deemed an inappropriate joke in what was a pretty uncomfortable interview. Cut to last night’s setting of The Late Show where host David Letterman asked Maher to explain what happened.

Rick Perry graciously appeared on CBS’s The Late Show with David Letterman Thursday night in the wake of his “oops!” moment at Wednesday’s GOP debate to read Letterman’s Top 10 List. The Texas Governor riffed on several hot topics, from fellow rival Mitt Romney (“one handsome dude”) to Justin Bieber, as he read the list of Top Ten Rick Perry Excuses.

Bill O’Reilly appeared on David Letterman ostensibly to promote his new book Killing Lincoln, but the conversation turned to a variety of items in the news:Occupy Wall Street, The Tea Party Movement and $16 muffins all got some airtime in a spirited and light back-and-forth. But the most tense part of the exchange was a surprisingly dramatic high-five between the two influential television personalities who have not always seen eye-to-eye, but put aside any previous tension for a symbolic demonstration of agreement. The harmonic convergence is now upon us!

Former president Bill Clinton paid a visit to the Late Show last night, where he weighed in on several topical political issues, including ideas for how to breathe new life into the economy. When host David Letterman brought up the concept of redistributing wealth — or at least the idea that the well-off would feel some sort of impetus to help out those not as well-off — Clinton seemed skeptical. “I’m always looking to blame somebody,” Letterman joked.

President Bill Clinton appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman last night and discussion of the Occupy Wall Street protests proved to be as interesting a recap as one might expect. The former president was generally very supportive of the movement, however he did not seem entirely impressed with the specific message currently coming from the protestors, summing up by saying “you need to be for something, not just against something,” before drawing comparisons to both the Tea Party and the Arab Spring.

Last night, Brian Williams appeared on Late Show and, considering he moderated a GOP debate, it’s unsurprising that politics found their way into a lot of the discussion. However, considering Williams is a network news anchor and all, he had to fight to stay as unbiased as possible which was tough as David Letterman did his best to egg him on. In fact, the whole conversation could be summed up as such; Letterman calls GOP candidate a “psych job” while Williams quickly assures him “That’s just the way all candidates are.”

Who: Eric Stangel (Letterman), Justin Stangel (Letterman), A.D. Miles (Fallon), Steve Bodow (Daily Show), Barry Julien (Colbert), moderated by Jason Sudeikis (SNL)
What: The New York Television Festival’s “Long Day’s Journey into Late Night”
Where: 92 Y Tribeca
When: September 22, 2011
Thumbs: Up

The Late Show with David Letterman has been on CBS for 18 whole years! That’s longer than most CW stars have been alive!* And that doesn’t even count the 12 or so years Letterman spent on the other network! So, last night, the host gave a special anniversary Top 10 List. And, in case you’re worried that it got all sentimental and treacly, I’ll just point out that the first on the list of “Ways Dave Celebrated his 18th Anniversary ” was “Got a lovely bouquet from the guy who wants to cut my tongue out.”

Leave it to David Letterman to make Two and a Half Men kind of funny. (/Snarky elitist New York media joke!) The show’s new star, Ashton Kutcher, stopped by Letterman’s show recently to discuss how the sitcom will change now that he’s taking over for Charlie Sheen.

Kutcher explained that he’ll be playing “a billionaire internet entrepreneur” (“Like a Steve Guttenberg?” Letterman wanted to know.) trying to get over a painful divorce.

Wow, this has been a scary week for late night comedians. Just a day after David Letterman mocked the jihadists threatening in message boards to kill him, his network-mate Craig Ferguson received an envelope in the mail containing white powder and a claim that it was anthrax. This, of course, brings up a very important question: Don’t terrorists get any channels other than CBS?

David Letterman isn’t afraid of your jihadist threats. Last week, the late-night funny man became the target of jihadists on Shumukh-al-Islam, a website which, according to SITE Intelligence Group, frequently posts messages from Al-Qaeda and their supporters, after he made an ill-received joke wherein he mocked the death of senior Al-Qaeda commander Ilyas Kashmiri by [...]

Late Show host David Letterman made news when it was revealed that he was the target of an online threat by a member of a jihadist internet forum, precipitating an investigation by the NYPD and the FBI. MSNBC terrorism analyst Evan Kohlmann, though, put the threat into perspective in an appearance with Contessa Brewer, stressing that the guy who made the threat was more an emboldened internet crank than a dangerous terrorist.

A contributor to jihadist online forum “shumukh al-Islam” has called on Muslims to attack and “cut the tongue” of CBS’ Late Show host David Letterman over comments he had made on his show. The Site Monitoring Service, a private firm which, as you may have gathered, monitors online activity, announced that the threat was made on Tuesday

The contributor in question, who goes by the name Umar al-Basrawi on the forum, was reacting to Letterman’s references to former terrorist leader Osama bin Laden and former Al Qaeda leader Ilyas Kashmiri, both of whom were killed by U.S. forces in Pakistan. Al-Basrawi wrote that Letterman had “put his hand on his neck and demonstrated the way of slaughter.”

Will this mean an end to any Late Show visits for New Jersey governor Chris Christie–or a lively and entertaining back-and-forth battle? In David Letterman‘s monologue Wednesday, the comic suggested the pie attack on Rupert Murdoch has public figures “tightening their security” so they don’t become the next victim–all but one, that is. Yep. You see, Christie loves pie attacks! Or baked alaska attacks, or ice cream sundae attacks–you name it, just throw food at him!

He’s known for his Top Ten lists, not his breaking news coverage, so you have to forgive David Letterman for getting some of the facts wrong in his coverage of the Rupert Murdoch story, which he described Tuesday night this way: “You know, Rupert Murdoch is on trial in London, England for killing a guy.” Well, no, not quite. But still, the pie-throwing incident during Mr. Murdoch’s testimony before a committee of the British Parliament led to a memorable Top Ten list: “Top Ten Thoughts Going Through Rupert Murdoch’s Mind During the Pie Attack.” And just in case that’s not enough for you, how about NBC’s Matt Lauer interrupting the whole thing–getting caught breaking in to Letterman’s historic Ed Sullivan Theater? Would that be something you might be interested in?

On Monday night’s Late Show, David Letterman wasted no time discussing the news that a drunken, out-of-work actor had broken in to the historic Ed Sullivan Theater overnight and trashed the lobby. In Letterman’s opening monologue, with a scowl on his face, he accusingly asked the audience, “how’d you folks get in?” As for the guy who broke in, Letterman confirmed that it was probably not archrival Leno. “I’m told that Jay has an alibi.”

In the ever-clever words of the New York Post, “there must be a better way to get your foot in the door at Late Show with David Letterman.” As the Post writes, a “boozed-up, down-on-his-luck Broadway actor wannabe” kicked in the glass doors of Letterman’s iconic Ed Sullivan Theater on Broadway Sunday, climbed inside and trashed the ornate lobby. “The inside looked like it was a drunken bar brawl,” a law-enforcement source told The Post.

Last night, David Letterman had a bit of fun with presidential candidate Michele Bachmann’s John Wayne/John Wayne Gacy mix up. And who can blame him? That’s the kind of story where you don’t really need to bother your highly-accomplished comedy writers for jokes. Presidential candidate accidentally saying she’s going to channel a convicted rapist and serial killer? That’s funny no matter how you tell it. So, Letterman went over the details and instructed Bachmann to do a little more “homework” before speaking (“What about page two of Google or Wikipedia?”). However, that wasn’t his only advice. He told her she should come on his show or else (statistically) she has no chance of winning.