America's Got Talent...for Unstimulating Broadcasts

I want my half-hour of life back I wasted watching America's Got Talent.

Jerry Springer serves as ringleader to this true celebrity circus (I won't even get into that show...), which is a painful parade of mediocre performers judged by two E-list celebrities and one oh-so typical British snob/Simon Cowell knock off. The general ineptitude of the judges' careers beautifully sets off the line up of sub par magicians, untrained singers, and sideshow acts. Most abrasive are the fame-hungry parents of some of the kids that are forced out on stage only to be brought to tears by the snobby Brit (whose name I could easily find out but is too inconsequential to merit the effort), and defended by the abominable Hasselhoff who, as headlines tell it, made no scruples of slurring insults at his own daughter.

The vomit-inducing back stories the majority of the performers conjure up are beyond the pale, these individuals' powers of invention would be better applied cowriting a piece of fiction with Mitch Albom. "I haven't sang in 11 years because my throat was run over by a tractor while living in the Bronx where I lost my entire family to their crack addiction while my girlfriend was cheating on me with half the neighborhood...but now I will dance/sing/contort to victory!," or some such nonsense.

I know no one's forcing me to watch this piece of primetime, but for some reason this show pushed me over the edge and incurred my disgust more than most (I don't get cable, so I'm mercifully spared many of the even less palatable reality TV going on).

America, if you've really got talent, prove it by using your time for something more worthy than turning your attention to this show.