Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, both members of the striking Writers Guild, will go back on the air January 7. In a statement yesterday, Comedy Central said they were still hoping for a "swift resolution to the current stalemate that will enable the shows to be complete again." The implication is that Stewart and Colbert are reluctant to go back to work—so why the hell are they? Other late-night hosts like David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel and Carson Daly (okay, in his case, "late-night host"), are also heading back to the airwaves. [NYTimes]

With Conan, Jay, Jimmy, and the rest of the late night gang announcing they're reluctantly headed to back to work without their striking writers, it seemed inevitable that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert wouldn't be far behind. They've released this joint statement on their January 7th return: "We would like to return to work with our writers. If we cannot, we would like to express our ambivalence, but without our writers we are unable to express something as nuanced as ambivalence." A more disappointed than ambivalent WGA has already issued a reminder that writerless versions of the shows aren't going to fill the Colbert and Stewart-shaped holes in our lives: "Comedy Central forcing Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert back on the air will not give the viewers the quality shows they've come to expect. The only way to get the writing staffs back on the job is for the AMPTP companies to come back to the table prepared to negotiate a fair deal with the Writers Guild." [AP, WGA.org]

Ben Karlin, who was an executive producer and head "Daily Show" writer for eight years, comes out to talk about how jealous "mainstream" journalists are about the Jon Stewart show. "They would always come up to us, everyone without fail would say, and especially like the big on-camera people, would come up to us and say 'God I wish I could do what you do.' Really? Do it! You have a camera, you have a microphone, you have a television show.... It was a prison of their own construction." [Huffington Post]

It seems Howard ("waiting for Drudge to post more about his new book") Kurtz might have every idea that Jon Stewart hates him! According to Gawker commenter sumgiushoodno, who attended the taping of last night's Daily Show, the last ten minutes of the interview, when Kurtz and Stewart really had their claws out, were cut in editing! Transcripts anyone?

Radar interviews former Daily Show correspondent Rob Corddry, and obtains an exclusive and shocking tidbit. That show's audience is composed of "college kids and NPR listeners" who "just applaud at every reference to some right-wing guest being taken down. Or anything slightly to the left of center." This surprises us, as our favorite thing about the show has always been the seemingly complete political and lifestyle homogeneity of its in-studio cacklers. But apparently the show's host, a guy named Jon Stewart, doesn't feel the same way we do, according to Corddry: "Jon absolutely hates it when people will just applaud at anything remotely liberal. It's a knee-jerk audience. It's so easy."

• The backstory of frighteningly perfect Teen Vogue intern Emily Weiss, as experienced by Lauren Conrad on Monday night's episode of The Hills. [Radar]
  

Nerdy humorist John Hodgman, who plays a bumbling PC in Apple commercials, will get a chance to rub shoulders with nerdy billionaire Bill Gates on Monday, January 29. That's when Gates will be appearing on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show, where Hodgman is the "Resident Expert." Geeks will be looking forward to seeing whether Gates and Hodgman combine to create some kind of nerdy critical mass. Valley flacks will be marveling at Microsoft's ability to get prime exposure just one hour before Vista goes on sale at midnight.

• A group of Columbia journalism students allegedly cheated on an ethics exam. There go those cushy Voice gigs. [Radar]
  

Fox News Channel plans on supplementing its regular, round-the-clock fake news coverage with a still-untitled "Daily Show for conservatives," which the network hopes will finally provide them with a much-needed forum for taking shots at liberals. Next on the FNC development slate-of-mirrors: a Colbert Report knock-off starring a comically delusional blowhard. [Variety]
Nielsen studies iPod users' viewing habits, discovers that most people don't use their devices to watch video downloads, perhaps finding the experience of squinting through an episode of Lost on a three-inch screen not as desirable as Apple had once hoped. [THR]
· Var reports on how your favorite supermodels (Tyra Banks, Heidi Klum, Padma Lakshmi) have overcome their perfect genes and fabulous racks to find great success hosting popular television shows. [Variety]
Fox Searchlight picks up the dark comedy Bonzai Shadowhands, which Rainn Wilson is writing as a starring vehicle for himself in which he'll play "a once-great ninja living a life of mediocrity." Whatever they gave him, he deserves three million more. [THR]
Imprisoned P.I. Anthony Pellicano writes a "guest column" for Variety (if your definition of guest column is reprinting an excerpt from a book of essays) "stating his case." But unlike OJ Simpson, he seems unwilling to go the "If I wanted to conduct illegal wiretaps of various Hollywood figures, this is how I would have done it" route, seriously reducing the piece's news value. [Variety]

Tragically cursed oddball filmmaker Terry Gilliam pounded the New York pavement yesterday, hustling those waiting in line for The Daily Show to promote his new movie, Tideland. On the brink of financial destruction as ever, Gilliam pleaded with the mob to go see his movie when it opens on Friday, or else it will get kicked out of theaters in a week (or less). Give the dude credit for not giving up despite years of disappointment; plus, he's still rocking that ratty vestigial ponytail thing.

Comedy Central's Insider blog sent a reporter down to street level to document director Terry Gilliam's "crashing" (i.e., pre-publicized attempt at organizing a "flash mob") of The Daily Show's audience line yesterday afternoon, where Gilliam tried to generate some buzz for Tideland, his latest movie:

We know it's all too easy to regurgitate a funny from last night's Daily Show, but trust us, this particular segment merits a look for sheer ranty showmanship over and above Jon Stewart's usual routine mockery. The main subject is CNN's waffling on the use of the phrase "brink of war," plus the appending of a cautionary question mark on same. The wrap consists of a long-overdue slam on the media trope of worrying how actual pain elsewhere translates into "pain at the pump" for Americans.

Not surprisingly, Owen "The Butterscotch Stallion" didn't say much during his Daily Show interview last night—the Stallion is a creature of majestic, beautiful deeds, not words. But at the onset of his chat to promote You, Me, and Dupree, Wilson seemed to be having so much trouble coaxing from his brain appropriate verbal expression of his Stallionness that a bemused Jon Stewart felt compelled to ask, "How high are you right now?" Wilson's resulting laugh and hypnotic swiveling in the guest chair gave us all the answer we already knew: Very, very high.

A real missed opportunity on this lightweight, predictable satire from The Daily Show, presenting the bizarro world North Korean version of the program. Worth it, however, for the punchiline riff on the "Moment of Zen."

• Jesus lives and saves us all: Star Jones is reportedly announcing her departure from The View, preferring instead to continue her rapid shrinking in the privacy of her own home. If we're lucky, her on-air farewell will be the exact opposite of Katie Couric's: hilarious and laced with blood. [Access Hollywood]
• Producer Dallas Austin has now been in a Dubai prison for one month for trying to bring drugs into the country for Naomi Campbell's birthday party; Campbell has yet to forgive him for ruining her big day. [MTV]
• A sneak peek at a former Playboy Bunny's tell-all, plus her requisite cleavage. [Hollywood Interrupted]
• Best Week Ever comedian Sherrod Small slams the John Mayer report, insists that the musician's use of the n-word was funny. [BWE]
• Extremely loud and incredibly derivative. [The Velvet Blog]
• One block of 103rd Street is renamed Humphrey Bogart Place in honor of the actor's childhood home. Not that it makes the locale any more appealing. [Cinematical]
• Unintentional hilarity: Laura Ingraham as the next Jon Stewart? It's a pilot we'd gleefully kill to get our hands on. [TV Newser]
• Overheard in NY gets its own stalker map. [Overplot]
• Kudos to the generous Daily News editors who allowed Ben Widdicombe to out both Anderson Cooper and Shep Smith in one fell swoop. [Gatecrasher]
• Hipster Swiss Army knives, crafted especially for Bedford Avenue stabbings. [Consumerist]
• Does Us Weekly have a problem with Britney Spears? Is People coddling her? And at what point will we all collectively agree to just look the fuck away? [Media Orchard]

Oh, dear Jon Stewart. Oh, dear fearless progressive gay-rights-loving Jon Stewart. How many questions, we wondered yesterday, would Jon ask our beloved Anderson Cooper, his guest last night, about the quasi-mysterious "Julio"? The answer: Zero. But Jon did talk Anderson up for a while on the topic of just how hot Angelina Jolie is — while the Coop held up his end of the conversation by giggling like a little girl and shifting nervously in his chair.

We just want make sure you know that our beloved Coopie will be Jon Stewart's guest on The Daily Show tonight. This is, in itself, not terribly newsworthy, as Anderson has long been willing to appear on just about any talk show or magazine cover that will have him, and that habit has become even more pronounced now that he has a book to promote.

While the Times is distracted by that insignificant little Sunni-Shiite battle brewing, and as the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian tensions escalate in the Mideast, and as Democrats and Republicans nationwide hate each other more and more, amNew York gives front-page coverage to the sectarian struggle that really matters.

• ABC anchor, cameraman show improvement after surgery. [ABCNews.com]
• Ted Koppel is a sucky op-edster, says Jack Shafer. [Slate]
• Even Dave Barry thinks newspapers are dead. [SFChron]
• Daily News TV editors doesn't get Jon Stewart's jokes, care much for the guy, or, it seems, care much for Stewart's fans. What was that, Dave, about newspapers being irrelevant? [NYDN]
• Syd Schanberg has misty water-colored memories of covering Donald Trump. [VV]
• Unsurprisingly, Pinch thinks everything at the Trib is just fabulous. When you're a scion, there is no rain on your parade. [AJR]
• Live like Anna: Vogue Living is on its way. [WWD]