"Forget about the fact that he's micromanaging the show and trying to do our job. It's his prerogative to oversee the operation," said an unnamed writer. "But the list just isn't funny."

Tentatively titled "Top Ten Stories Tiger Woods is Giving to the Cops," the list includes such excuses as "Let he who hath not sinned  cast the first stone," and "Why don't you leave the young couple alone? Don't you know how hard it is when you've been married only a few years and you have a young child or two, and there are the pressures of being in the public spotlight?"

Said the unnamed writer, "That second list item violates every Top Ten principle. It's not pithy. That second joke is two sentences, the second sentence being practically a run-on. The Top Ten is sacred. Like the Ten Commandments. It's supposed to do unto others as you would never have others do unto you."

The writer said that it's not uncommon for the staff and Letterman to haggle over what should be on the Top Ten list but that the breach over the Tiger Woods list was irreparable. Every comedic line the staff suggested was rejected by Letterman.

One of the rejected lines in the staff's version of "Top Ten Stories Tiger Woods is Giving to the Cops" was  "If you had a drab, ugly wife named Regina whom you finally married after having her hang around you for two decades, you'd want to knock yourself unconscious by crashing into a fire hydrant, too."

This is not the first time Letterman has clashed with his writing staff over a Top Ten list. In 1994 Letterman did not touch the O.J. Simpson case ("because he was a fan," said a writer) and actually allowed the lame Jay Leno to make some headway in the late night wars. And in 1997 Letterman didn't touch the Marv Albert cross-dressing scandal because Albert was a friend.

Meanwhile, the Golf Channel's new "Late Night with Gary McCord," is expected to make hay with the Tiger controversy.  Some of McCord's jokes for tomorrow night have been leaked to the website TMZ, which reports McCord will be saying such things as "Hey, Tiger's wife is getting a little long in the tooth. Even Jim Nantz is running around with a woman Tiger's wife's age now."