EARTH BITES:PUT A GUN TO MY HEAD IF YOU WANT ME TO WATCH TALENT/REALITY TV

The new land of TV opportunity has names like "American Idol"and "Faded Celebrities Like To Dance", or something to that effect. They are cheap to produce and they are incredibly popular with their niche television audience.

I am not now, nor will I ever be, a part of that niche.

Despite the handicap of never actually watching any of these programs, I am still aware of the big players in the game. The biggest dog on the block is a guy named Simon Cowell. He is the bad guy on American Idol.

Apparently he is soon to be a former bad guy on Idol as he moves into a new chapter of TV talent shows that require an a****le as the lead hand. There is always new ground to be broken by TV as great creative minds find new ways to beat a bad and tired concept like talent shows to death.

So Simon will move onto a new project of stupid people tricks and somebody will replace Simon on American Idol. I would guess that it will be pretty easy to find another surly guy with lots of opinions and little or no tact. The woods are actually full of them. The only obstacle might be finding another obnoxious guy with a British accent and a valid green card.

These days I look at the TV schedule for some visible sign that it has found its way out of these hour- long reasons to put my foot through the screen. As long as the schedule is dotted with malignant TV tumors masqueraded as talent shows starring formerly unknown jerk store d***wads like Simon Cowell, TV will remain on the critically ill list.

And my TV set will be in mortal danger of a sudden and unnecessary death by blunt trauma.

A guy can only take so much of this crap on TV, the most sacred of couch potato institutions.

Jim Sutherland @mystarcollectorcar.com