But I have to step up and say, "No, Oprah, my close personal friend! Thank you!"

For the years of gab, chatter, talk, giveaways, celebs, and more gab, chatter, and talk.

So which was your favorite Oprah:

*Tom Cruise jumping up and down until his career ended.

*Tyler Perry actually admitting it! That he was abused!

And they were showing Enough Already! With Peter Walsh, a program in which an "organizational expert" helps people de-clutter their homes while serving psychological insight into what they're emotionally holding onto and how they can let go of it along with the piles of junk.

Well, Gayle was moved to tears to hear that on TV, since it's not the kind of thing you get up the nerve to vocalize in person.

But satirical commentator Bill Maher objected to her recent, elaborate series of giveaway shows and said so in a sardonic holiday-themed video he just made waves with.

Well, last night on MSNBC's The Last Word With Lawrence O'Donnell, I chatted about the video and decided that both parties are right--Maher for calling the talk show queen on her pandering and Oprah herself for generously giving diamonds to people who eat dirt for dinner.

In fact, it must be in Barbara's contract that her interview subjects don't leave the studio until they shed some showy, large-scale tears -- and they invariably oblige, just to get out of there.

So when Oprah Winfrey was interviewed by Walters for an imminent special, she got all weepy on her favorite subject -- Gayle King.

"She is the mother I never had," said Oprah, welling up. "She is the sister everybody would want. She is the friend that everybody deserves.

"I don't know a better person. I don't know a better person."

So says Kitty Kelley in her new unauthorized biography of the talk show queen.

According to the book, there is "no foundation for the rumors of a lesbian relationship."

None whatsoever!

Absolutely lesba-zilch!

Are you buying this?

Gayle King photo by David Shankbone

But Stedman never seemed that persuasive a force to me, and now Rosie O'Donnell has stirred the pepperpot by saying on the radio that Oprah and Gayle certainly seem like a couple.

Out-and-proud Rosie was just saying what a lot of people have always been thinking. But are they? As I cracked on Curtis Sliwa's radio show last night, "If the Birkenstocks fit..."

Anyway, here's the very thoughtful letter Jack wrote to Oprah's peeps, hoping to enlighten them on how to better serve the subject: