>> jon: that's our show. join us next week at 1:00. here it is your moment zen. >> ty cobb began to show an excessive animosity towards blacks. when a black grounds keeper tried to shake his captioning sponsored by comedy central captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org captioning sponsored by comedy central ["the colbert report" theme music playing]

[eagle caw] [cheers and applause] >> stephen: welcome to the report. thank you, ladies and gentlemen. [cheers and applause] [crowd changt stephen] [crowd chanting stephen b.c.] >> stephen: thank you sox please, sit down, everybody. folks, welcome to chit chat, where we girls -- [cheers and applause] we girls just sit around and talk to each other. nation, you know if you watch the show, one of hardest thing about be me is always being

right. [ laughter ] no one will watch baseball with me anymore, because i correctly predict every pitch will be boring. i'm like cassandra. [ laughter ] well, lo, it hath come once more to pass just as i spaketh it last fall, when i brought you news of a study that found men are sexually attracted to their female platonic friends. men were also more attracted to female acquaintances, female strangers they saw on the street, pictures of women on billboards, sears catalogs, and particularly plump couch cushions. [ laughter ] [cheers and applause] oh, sure. everybody laughed. well, let's see them laugh at this! "man has sex with a sofa in the street." [ laughter ] evidently, a 46-year-old man in

waukesha, wisconsin, seen here in his eharmony profile, was arrested for getting all sexual with a sectional. [ laughter ] now i know there's not much to do in wisconsin, but come on, buddy-- haven't you ever heard of meth? you seem like a natural. [ laughter ] and look, folks, i get no satisfaction from the fact that i called this. and unlike the let-it-all-hang-out liberals out there, i am willing to come out and say that roadside sofa-boning is wrong. [ laughter ] because i know what's next: public schools teaching our children about safe sex-- and handing out plastic slipcovers to put in their wallets. [ laughter ] now it's easy to blame this 46-year-old man for just about anything. [ laughter ] but frankly a lot of these couches are asking you to sleep with them. [ laughter ]

you slut! [ laughter ] this is what the country has come to. [ laughter ] another thing i'm not happy about, folks: obama's failed second term. it doesn't start for two weeks and it is a disaster. point is, i gave it a chance. even members of obama's cabinet are jumping off the s.s. barack like rats leaving for an opportunity in the private sector. [ laughter ] but the thing that disturbs me and my fellow pundits with air time to fill, is who obama has picked to replace them. >> have a look at this picture. ask yourself. look closely. what's missing? >> do you notice something? there are no women in the picture. >> where have the women gone? >> it shows the president with senior advisers in the oval office, all of them are male. >> stephen: those four white guys are right. [ laughter ] this is the 21st century. when filling his cabinet, there's only one question he should be asking: >> hey, where the white women at?

[ laughter ] [cheers and applause] >> stephen: that's true. folks, look. this picture is damning. and i don't care if 43% of obama's appointees have been women. they're not in this photo. i live by one rule. if i can't see it, it does not exist-- oh, my god! where's my hand?! ohh. i thought obama took it. don't ever scare me like that again. [ laughter ] of course, obama's not letting me down. i love white men. i sleep with one every night that i know of. [ laughter ] no, folks, i'm heartbroken for my liberal friends. and so is former governor and formerly relevant mike huckabee, [ laughter ] who was publically worried about them on his radio show. >> now a lot of those females who supported barack obama are

scratching their heads, and they're saying, "whoa! how come there is so much testosterone in the obama cabinet and so little estrogen?"" [ laughter ] >> stephen: yes, huckabee and hucka-me are outraged on behalf of you estrogen soaked females. because obama's not turning out the way you wanted him to. if anything, he's turning out the way we want him to. and that should make you furious that we're delighted that you're angry. [ laughter ] now in terms of diversity, the first lady is an african american woman, but who knows if she's staying? the way things are going, she leaves and the president replaces her with larry summers. [ laughter ] how does he get those amazing arms? [ laughter ] and the problem here is not just that they're white men. it's which white men. as you know, treasury secretary timothy geithner is stepping down to spend more time with his forehead. [ laughter ]

folks -- [ laughter ] and who is obama picking to replace him? >> president obama nominated jack lew as a presidentry secretary. >> jack lew who? >> jack lew. who is jack lew? who is that? >> stephen: yeah, who is that? jack lew. 'cuz i don't know who jack lew is-- and neither do you. that's not a picture of jack lew. this is, and you didn't notice. you racist. [cheers and applause] folks, there's big problems with this guy. >> heard the discussion that republicans really just don't get along with this guy, they don't agree with his philosophy, they think he's really hard to deal with in negotiation. >> stephen: no no, jimmy--

-- no, no, the big problem. >> there's jack lew's signature. >> stephen: folks, once lew's treasury secretary, this pubic hair masquerading as an autograph will appear on all our money, okay? making our currency a laughingstock. our money should have nothing ridiculous on it, just old men in wigs and pyramids with eyes. is this even a signature or did he start drawing charlie brown and give up after the hair? [ laughter ] good grief. and it got no better when lew explained his fiscal philosophy, saying quote "i describe budgets as a tapestry: when it's woven together, the picture amounts to our hopes and dreams of a nation." [cheers and applause] didn't get a word of that.

folks, the united states dollar bill deserves a signature worthy of a great nation. so to preserve the value of the money, i want you to send it to me. i'll erase his signature and replace it with mine, and then return it to you, minus a small handling fee. [ laughter[cheers and applause]

>> stephen: welcome back, everybody. nation, i believe seven entitled to my own opinion. this is tip of the hat, wag of the finger. [cheers and applause] the tip and hat people are in the house. you know me boom. you know me, i'm a gadget guy. soifs disappointed to learn about a new invention that set our culture back. >> this is the hapifork. believe it or not this fork measure how's quickly you are eating. fit finds thawr eating too quickly it's going vibrate in europe hand and force you to slow down. >> stephen: first of all

americans have something that make yours hand tremble so we stop eating. it's called a stroke. that's why i'm giving a wag of my finger to hapifork. this can comes from hong kong where they have a century's old tradition of tablewear that prevents you from eating. [ laughter ] which one is the spoon? [ laughter ] i say if we're improving our utensils, it's time to move beyond the hapifork to my patented new "self-loathing food sluice." [ laughter ] it's a combination funnel and high capacity grinder that delivers a constant stream of nutrient into your gorge. [ laughter ] stephen colbert's self-loathing food sluice is available in

small, medium, and "i hate myself." [ laughter ] next up on tip hat wag fing, i loves me my b-ball. it's fast paced, tough, and aggressive. and that's just when players are punching the fans. [ laughter ] but now there's an even better reason to enjoy the game. >> what was up with kevin garnett and carmelo anthony last night? all night long, chipping, pushing and shoving in the celtics' win over the knicks. melo even waited outside for the celtics by their team bus to have further words with kevin garnett after the game. it's blowing up all over the place. why was he so upset? reportedly garnett told carmelo anthony his wife tasted like honey nut cheerios. [audience reacts] >> stephen: oh snap, krackle, and pop! [ laughter ] carmelo, you just got apple-jacked! kevin's saying he had your wife

reality star la la vazquez, as a part of this complete breakfast! [ laughter ] this brings me to a tip of my hat to kevin garnett, for forging a bold new path in product placement. [ laughter ] this isn't just trash talk, it's hefty brand trash talk. [ laughter ] forget gym shoes and sprite, from now on, all nba games should be filled with athletes incorporating national brands into their taunting. "yo mama's so fat she should switch to chobani non-fat greek yogurt, now with active probiotics." [ laughter ] [cheers and applause] or "i'm gonna cut through your d like the fellowes powershred 84ci. [ laughter ] they'll be scraping your raggedy 1-1/2 inch cross-cut particles out of the six-gallon pullout bin. and you won't be scoring on the return either, because like the 84ci, i'm 100% jam proof--

bee-otch!" [cheers and applause] but kevin, as much as i admire your business acumen, it's his wife. lay off the derogatory comments that could be misinterpreted as sexual. just say something complimentary like "she's grrrrrrrr-eaat!" [ laughter ] we'll be right back.

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[cheers and applause] >> stephen: welcome back, everybody. my guest tonight is an indie favorite with a new solo album called former lives. i'll ask him questions leftover from former guests. please welcome benjamin gibbard. [cheers and applause] hey, nice to meet you. thanks for coming on. i want to get straight it's benjamin gibbard, right? >> yeah, or ben.

>> stephen: i was specifically told would you like to be called benjamin gibbard? why the shift? >> benjamin looks nicer on an album than ben. seems a little more formal. >> stephen: you know what is formal, a tie, a shave. stand closer to the razor tomorrow. >> i'm from seattle this is -- >> stephen: as formal as you get. >> formal ware where i come from. >> stephen: people you know from the death cab from cutie, the poafsal service. huge indy band. must be i'm over 27 and i know what it is. [ laughter ] why go out on your own? are these -- the death cabs are weeping some place? >> no, i think. >> stephen: did you break up? >> they are doing just fine. i'm a song writer. i find myself with more songs than the band can record and i

found myself with enough songs to make a record and i decided to do my own thing. >> stephen: they are extras. >> these are all top offs. >> stephen: this is prince throws one over here and over there. it would be a better record if it was like prince. >> stephen: it's really good. i heard the song you are going to do tonight called bigger than love. >> with miss aimee mann. >> jon: i was going to surprise the audience that she was here but you go ahead and host. okay. [ laughter ] this album, as you said they were written over the course of how many years? >> seven or eight years. >>. >> stephen: okay. any worry that they are going to be obsolete in anyway? is there a pets.com reference? >> i try to write songs that deal with relatively universal themes. so the idea that could you put it on at any point and it would

resonate in some bay. >> stephen: as long as people still speak english. thousands of now they may not be able to listen to it. >> the record is predicated upon that fact, that is true. yes. [ laughter ] >> stephen: mmm-hmm. what else do you like to do? other than music, what do you like doing benjamin? [ laughter ] >> i like to -- >> stephen: do we have to talk about music? >> we can talk about something >> stephen: whatever your agenda is, let's do it. >> i don't have any other interests or hobbies. [ laughter ] >> stephen: well, then let's -- then we're done. [ laughter ] we talked about the album. we asked you about death cab for cutism you blute whole aimee mann thing. all can i do is thank you and ask you to do a song.

that's really all i have to offer. i should probably do that we should probably move on to that. >> stephen: benjamin, thank you so much for joining america album is "former lives. we'll be right back w

>> stephen: and now way song off the al bum former lives, ladies and gentlemen, benjamin gibbard and aimee mann. ♪ ♪ it's bigger than is brighter than all the stars combined ♪ ♪s dwarfing the sun burning within my heart and mind ♪ ♪ i live with my memories, busting fervor of new york where on 59th street we quarreled

and broke the bathroom door ♪ ♪ because you were just drinking, drinking til you could hardly see oh, how much i loved you but i couldn't bring myself to leave ♪ ♪ note it's bigger than love brighter than all the stars combined ♪ ♪ it's dwarfing the sun burning within my heart and mind♪ ♪ note our summers in paris, the seine overflowing with champagne and i knew you stepped out but you knew that i had done the same ♪ ♪ and we had a child there but we couldn't raise her on our own ♪ so our house got crowded and i'd never felt so all alone ♪

♪ it's bigger than love brighter than all the stars combined ♪ ♪ it's dwarveg the sun burning within my heart and mind ♪ ♪ it's bigger than love brighter than all the stars combined ♪ ♪ dwarfing the sun burning within my heart and mind ♪ ♪ ♪ stranded in asheville failing to fix a broken head snet♪ ♪ you're in california doing the work of lesser men ♪ ♪ oh, what of our daughter, oh, what of the love that we once shared ♪ ♪