New York Magazine found the "interview" noteworthy, saying:

"Last night Stephen Colbert provided the "Oh Snap!" moment of the evening when he shut down Republican superflack Mary Matalin mid-argument. His rebuttal was so perfect that it made her completely drop her line of reasoning and complement him, which is no small victory."

watch

This was in response to the one attempt Matalin made to revert to her standard talking points in service of the Dick Cheney legacy, and Colbert left her stammering with his quick retort.

Far more fun for me was watching her babble on in an attempt to keep Stephen from screaming "BINGO!"

Here's a rough, highly edited transcript of some of my favorite snippets from the interview:

SC: "I've never had a republican strategist of your caliber before and if

you don't mind, I want to play a little game I've wanted to play for

years. It's called Republican Talking Points Bingo." MM: "Ooohhh...." SC: "Uh, everytime you say something that's a Republican talking point,

I just mark it off. You mind?" MM: "No." SC: "Okay, that's great. First question...Why are you wearing a cross of

Jesus, he preached social Justice, He was a communist, right?" MM: "Yes He did. He also preached 'teach them how to fish, don't

give them a fish, right? You don't work, you don't eat." SC: "He said 'I will make you fishers of men.' I don't believe Jesus

said 'If you don't work, you don't eat.' I believe that was from

Cool Hand Luke. (snip) I believe you're paraphrasing."

Try as she might, Matalin was not actually able to refrain from the talking points, though Stephen mostly gave her a pass.

SC: "Talk me down the nightmare path. What happens if the Democrats

push thru reconciliation?" MM: "Well, they already passed reconciliation, you know. Today was when

the aptly named 'SLAUGHTER RULE' took place and you get to be

self-executing now... you don't have to vote on this now." SC: "Self-executing...that's committing suicide!" MM: "We'll see. It might be that they are committing suicide. They

don't want to vote on this bill but they want to say they voted for

Health Care, so that's called 'The Slaughter Rule' and that's

self-executing so we're past reconciliation, which..." SC: "What happens to America if this goes through, Madame? How long do

we have?" MM: "Can I glance at my BINGO! card?" SC: "No. Not yet. It doesn't work if you know what the answers are."

I never saw Stephens BINGO! card, but I imagined it must have looked like this:





After some banter about the upcoming mid-term elections and Rahm,

SC: "If the Democrats get this through will the Republicans run on

repealing Health Care? I've heard that..I've heard that..

McConnell said that. Well do you think they should run on

repealing Health Care? MM: "They will run on repealing this kind of architecture that is this

expansionist. They will also run on the targeted reforms that are

in this architecture. SC: "I don't know what you mean. I'm not an architect. What do you

mean?" MM: "I'm trying to knock you out of BINGO! So far..." SC: "You've done very well at not saying any of the things that everyone

says. You haven't said much, though.

You've talked real s-l-o-w-l-y."

Feel free to add ideas in the comments for Republican Talking Points I overlooked in my version of Republican Talking Point BINGO!.

I'll post the video of the interview when it comes up later today, if the diary survives. Otherwise, watch for it here.

Update: Colbert Nation now has the video up here

h/t BBQ Chicken Madness and Scarce

I still can't get the embedding right though.