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So I'm watching "Deal or no Deal" tonight and I can't help but think, this has gotta be one of the worst shows I've ever seen. The whole damn program is so fake--especially Howie Mandel's feeling of importance. The "banker" is bogus (I'm sure they have a complex mathematical system to determine what sorta offer the contestant gets). I find the contestants--hand-picked based on physical beauty and energy--completely unlikable. I hate the way the show drags out every moment, trying to build drama and excitement. I hate how every decision is crucial--as if the future of the entire free world depends on it. And I hate the way everyone in the audience is totally into the show...my goodness people: save your energy for something that actually affects you. It's horrible, nauseating--completely brain-dead.

...and yet I can't look away. I think it's because I want to see the people lose. I want to see the show crash and burn. I want it off the air. But somehow I find myself getting sucked in.

Take tonight's show. The contestant was a 19-year old gal, young, pretty, and full of life--pretty much everything I detest in another human being (a girl like that is already used to getting everything she wants in life: what does she need money for). I wanted her to lose. I found the show to be an insult to my intelligence. Yet there I was, baking cookies and staring at the screen every free second I had.

Maybe that's why those game shows are such big hits: because you can watch while baking cookies or doing laundry. Unlike a "Lost" or West Wing" (shows that require a brain to understand), you don't hafta give "Deal or no Deal" a high percentage of your attention: you can watch while doing other stuff.

And they got this stupid "Pick the Lucky Case" contest during the show. Viewers have a chance to pick one of six cases. All correct guessers are put into a drawing and a $10,000 winner is announced near the end of the show. Not a bad idea to increase audience participation and viewership.

Until you get to the specifics. It cost a buck to enter the contest. It's like buying a freakin' lottery ticket--only with worse odds. And here's the biggest scam of all: by the time us folks on the west coast are watching, a winner has already been picked. Everything that happens on the east occurs three hours before us. I'm sure they announce a winner for that show--it just makes sense. Therefore, anyone not on the east coast is entering the contest (at a buck a pop) after the winner was already selected. Talk about your ultimate scam. And considering the show has 10 million viewers a night, I'm willing to be way more than 10,000 people enter. What a great source of income the producers found: get the viewers to chip in a buck.

Man, there sure is a lot of crap on TV nowadays. I sure wish they would bring back "90210."

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2006