American Idol Eliminations as Expected

Considering who just got booted to the bottom three of this week's American Idol show, Pia Toscano shouldn't have been the one eliminated. JLo is upset, Randy Jackson is disgusted, Steven Tyler, well who knows what he's feeling, other celebrities are fuming, and the viewers are definitely appalled and disappointed.

Who gets the blame? Certainly not the voting viewers who are doing exacting what they're told week after week. The blame should go to the judges and producers. Since the real competition began, at the close of each show either Randy or Ryan Seacrest will encourage the viewers to "vote for their favorite Idol contestant." What they should be saying is 'I know you have your favorite, but this is about talent. Vote for the best talent.'

How about eliminating the judges? Their often bad opinions don't really seem to matter anyway.

Last week's castoffs, Thia Megia and Naima Adedapo were pretty much expected - no harm, no foul. However, Pia's departure was not the biggest blunder of the season so far. It was saving Casey Abrams two weeks ago. It was too early in the competition to waste the precious save. Even last night would have been too soon to use the save. Save the save for the last five weeks when the competition really gets hot. The saving of Casey was for the benefit of the tour that occurs when the competition is over. That's another reason why we shouldn't feel too bad. The top ten (now eleven since the Abrams' save) finalists qualify to participate and make money on the concert tour across America this summer.

Of the remaining contestants there are only two pure talents, Jacob Lusk and Scotty McCreery. With church and country, how can you go wrong?