With our focus firmly on trash-talking and all-ins, there’s very little that will tear my friends and me away from the table on the rare occasion that we’re able to get together for a poker game. (And we’re only playing for brownies, I swear, officer.)

So it was evidence of a true pop culture/national affairs moment when the activities came to a screeching halt, the Cubs got booted off the TV playing silently in the background and we rushed into the living room to see how “Saturday Night Live” and Tina Fey would skewer Thursday night’s Biden-Palin debate. As MSNBC reports, “SNL’s” ratings Saturday night grew 23 percent over last week, likely in response to viewers who – like my pack of friends – knew the veep debate would serve Fey material like meat on a platter. Even the clip of the skit on NBC’s Web site rang up about 1.6 million views as of late Sunday night.

We weren’t disappointed; each week, Fey further perfects the characterization of Palin as folksy, cocky, resolutely unbound by logic: “I believe marriage is meant to be a sacred institution between two unwilling teenagers.” “We don’t know if this climate change whosey-whatsit is manmade or if it’s just a natural part of the end of days.”

And Queen Latifah’s reactions as Gwen Ifill were comic gold: wordless, stupefied double and triple takes. “Were [Palin] simply to do an adequate job tonight at no point, cry, faint, run out of the building or vomit you should consider the debate a tie.”

Personally, I didn’t think the skit held up as well as the previous two weeks’ had. Jason Sudeikis as Joe Biden wasn’t as strong as Amy Poehler who, impersonating Hillary Clinton and Katie Couric, shares with Fey the awareness that impression humor is about observing and developing a specific character. Sudeikis’ Biden was broader and more over-the-top: “Don’t tell me that I’m part of the Washington elite. I come from the absolute worst place on Earth: Scranton, Pennsylvania. And Wilmington, Delaware, isn’t much better.” But taking the ridiculous elements of Joe Biden and exaggerating them made for laughs but not a character.

Also, at about 12 minutes – half the length of a sitcom episode – the skit was overlong. (The Palin-Clinton skit was five minutes and change, the Palin-Couric about six-and-a-half.)

But no matter. SNL is a rerun next week, but it should be a safe bet that Fey will be back Oct. 18 and 25 and Nov. 1 to keep jacking up the ratings and creating an indelible character, a confection of pop culture and politics.

And there’s a chance that Palin may show up in the flesh for one of these occasions. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Palin may appear with Fey, perhaps to spoof one of Fey’s AmEx ads.

You can bet we’ll be tuned in.

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.