Columnist Eugene Robinson says terrorists win if Sanjaya not voted off AI

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/05/AR2007040501792.html

Well, not really. I think this appeared as an editorial on Thursday and it takes a pretty funny but logical approach to the whole Sanjaya conumdrum.

The judges have to cow-over...the entire concept of the show is a deck of cards. (They: Simon Cowell, Randy, Paula, Simon Fuller, they're at the hands of an American public, they have no real power in their own concept.) If they continued to excoriate Sanjaya and he continued to win, the hypothetical ass of the concept would show though. What makes AI work, is also its' Achilles heel: America Decides.

We are deciding.

That means the 30 million people who love it and tune in regularly and vote to select the next American Idol have no more power than the people who hate American Idol and are actively voting for Sanjaya to destroy the show. It's democracy in action. We as a people, a zoon politikon, are exploiting our right to make AI implode or work. Just because it isn't working the way they meant it to or they way many hope it will...does not make the latest season of AI any less valid. If Sanjaya wins, he is exactly equal to Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson, Ruben Studdard, and every other past winner...because they are all the exact same "beast", the selected winner of a competition judged by the vox populi.

The only way the terrorists win...is if AI and its' backers break the promise to give a contract and promotion to the winner of the season. They will have done more than renege to Sanjaya and every other contestant...they will have broken faith with the public will of America.

I'm reminded of a quote from Saint Bonaventure when he was asked of his fame as a "doctor of the church": "An example of the monkey: The higher it climbs, the more you see of its behind." Reflect on that as you will.