Review: Is 'The Talk' merely a moms' gabfest?

Daytime talk shows are supposed to involve talk, but one day in, it's difficult to say what this talk will be about. Co-hosted by Julie Chen, Sara Gilbert, Leah Remini, Holly Robinson Peete, Sharon Osbourne and Marissa Jaret Winokur, "The Talk" (WCBS/2, 2 p.m.) is largely modeled on a mothers' support group and dedicated to the notion that, as Chen explained, "we all need our girlfriends."

Gilbert said Monday she got the idea for the show after she had her own kids and wanted to talk to others about the challenges of motherhood. But when a show jags from a standard celebrity interview (Christie Brinkley, making a plea for organic food, Internet kindness and Alexa Ray Joel's new album) to a noisy and insistently uninformative discussion about when toddlers need to know about sex, you're left to wonder at what point that reasonable idea jumped the tracks.

Girlfriends, in fact, do talk about sex, guys, husbands, kids and life in general, but that can get old fast, as "The View" - which clearly was the inspiration for "The Talk" - long ago learned.

Occasionally gaseous and primed to exact maximum Internet and press attention, "The View" is also usually about something - namely the hosts' reactions to national issues, hitched to their own political biases.

Like what happened on Monday's show - on which the ladies rehashed last week's Bill O'Reilly controversy. Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg staged a brief walkout Thursday after O'Reilly said "Muslims killed us on 9/11."

"I hit my saturation point," Goldberg said Monday. "I had to get up and leave because I knew what was coming next - I was going to cuss him out." Added Behar: "On this show, we always speak about standing up to bigotry, so I stood up."

Bill O'Reilly to "The Talk" for parenting tips, anyone?