Everywhere you look - yard signs, advertisements, news coverage - the buzz is all about the candidates and the looming November 4th election. NBC may have made the biggest jump on the election bandwagon when Lorne Michaels made the announcement that NBC would be adding on a three week, prime time slot leading up to the election with a "Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday."

The Thursday night presidential debate comedy slots have definitely delivered, thanks to its participants like - Fred Armisen as Barack Obama, Darrel Hammond as John McCain, and returning "SNL" alums like Tina Fey as Sarah Palin and Chris Parnell as Tom Brokaw. But the SNL poll numbers were propelled to its largest audience in more than 14 years, thanks to Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's appearance on the actual "Saturday Night Live" episode, which aired on Oct. 18th. Figures from Nielsen Media Research showed that 15 million people watched the telecast, either live on Saturday night or on a video recorder the next day. NBC said it was the largest turnout for "Saturday Night Live" since Nancy Kerrigan hosted on March 12, 1994 -- and the third-largest audience since Nielsen's People Meter technology was rolled out in September 1987.

I was a little disappointed by the brief appearance by Palin on SNL, but think that all candidates have been great sports at appearing on the show, regardless of the motives - whether to help boost their campaign or poke fun / laugh at themselves. With the election only a few days away, candidates will be doing whatever they can to gain the support of undecided voters. So it doesn't matter if it takes watching SNL to get you pumped up for the election - just get out and vote on November 4th!