What is WRONG with this Country?

So I'm doing my morning coffee drop-in on a few blogs and cruise Google News thing when I scroll down the page to find these life-changing stories from the Entertainment section of Google News: American Idol, Dancing With the Stars and American Idol's Paula Abdul Trips Over Her Dog and Breaks Her Nose. Wow.

I'm saddened, alarmed and thinking of becoming an expatriate. Nothing has polluted our culture more in recent years than reality TV. And now it's everywhere. Everything's a contest. Who wants to become a film director? Who wants to create a commercial for the Super Bowl? Who wants their mom to get a makeover? Who wants to be told on national TV that whatever they brought to the table really, REALLY sucked and they didn't make the cut? Who is so desperate for their 15 minutes of Shame and/or Fame that they will take either, as long as it means they're on TV?

As for American Idol, I've never watched it and never will. It is based solely on singing - and singing of a particular Atlantic City Vegas Branson Celine Dion Mariah Carey Cher Sinatra style that I hate. (Oh yes, I really DID just say something disparaging about "ol Blue Eyes." Never thought he had an ounce of talent. He talked his way through lyrics he didn't even write.) These contestants do cover songs, they don't play instruments, and they turn out by the hundreds of thousands when auditions open up for the next season.

I'm not sure who to blame for all of this. I think the fault may lie with Bob Saggett and his old show, America's Funniest Home Videos. It was the predecessor to YouTube, where alarming numbers of ordinary people created fake situations for the camera and then sent them to Bob in the hopes that he'd show their stupid clip on his stupid show. Just how many dresses and pairs of pants actually fall off at wedding receptions in this country in a year? Why would you cut down a tree right next to a parked car? And why did you have a video camera rolling when you were cutting down said tree? Everyone is so desperate.

There really are Two Americas, but not the two that John Edwards talks about.