American Music Awards Still Laboring Under Delusion That They Matter

What if ABC aired an awards show and no one cared? The 26th annual American Music Awards show aired last night, unbeknownst to most of America.

The AMAs were founded by Dick Clark in 1976, when he was just 127 years old and still in the height of his popularity. According to Wikipedia, the AMAs are part of the "Big Three" major music award shows, the others being the Grammy Awards and Tiger Beat's Super Cute List. The AMAs have two major differences that separate it from the Grammy Awards: the AMAs don't have an award for Best Single/Record, and while Grammys are given out according to complicated system of examining ram entrails, the AMAs give out their awards based upon a survey of the last 100 people featured on PeopleOfWalmart.com.

According to many artists, winning an AMA holds roughly the same street cred as winning a Teen Choice Award, except that the actual award isn't nearly as cool as the Teen Choice surfboard. The last 20 winners of the "prestigious" Artist of the Year Award gave it to their valets as a tip upon leaving the ceremony.

The show featured many artists pantomiming songs they didn't actually write. Janet Jackson opened the show with a 30 minute performance of songs that no one knew. All of last night's nominees and winners signed an anonymity clause, thus making their names and the awards they won are not available to the public. Some nominee's include Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift, Kings of Leon, Beyonce, Hootie, and Twlight. Because Michael Jackson is deceased, it was announced that he won four awards including Best Death, Best Celebrity Scandal, Favorite Rock/Pop Album and Best Jackson.

Adam Lambert, America's favorite 2nd place winning gay American Idol not named Clay Aiken, had the biggest controversy of the night when he did something deemed too homosexual for ABC, who cut it from the program. Lady Gaga also provided some controversy when she had sex live on the stage during the 4th hour of the broadcast.

Last night's American Music Awards drew a 12.4 rating, which means that twelve people watched it. A thirteenth person had the television on but was making out with his girlfriend at the time and wasn't paying attention.

Obama Reaches Across Aisle, Finally Earns Bipartisan Support

Barack Obama's off-the-record candor has finally earned him the bipartisan support that he has sought since becoming the 44th President of the United States. Although he has failed to drum up support across the aisle for his universal health care and economic policies, and his poll numbers have fallen to personal lows, his recent off-the-record comments about Kanye West have finally brought critics over to his side. During downtime in a recent interview, he was caught on camera saying, "He's a jackass," while discussing Kanye's recent interruption of Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards. This elicited laughter from the crew filming the interview, although Obama immediately seemed to tense up in the afterwards of the remark. In recent days, he has come to embrace his candid dig at Kanye.

This week, Obama has made the rounds on the late night shows, appearing only to say his new catch phrase, "He's a jackass!" Even his critics have grudgingly offered praise. Conservative stalwarts like Glen Beck said, "Finally, the first real, un-scripted thing that Obama has said. Something we, in both parties, can get behind." Right-wing radio mainstay Rush Limbaugh opined, "Obama is finally backing up his rhetoric about bipartisanship, I think we can all get behind him in calling Kanye West a jackass." MSNBC firebrand Keith Olbermann offered effusive praise for Obama calling him a "revolutionary" and saying that "this criticism is as important as anything Obama has said or done to date. Bravo, Mr. President." A recent Rasmussen Poll has shown a significant 10 point jump in his approval ratings since the footage aired and perhaps, more importantly, that Obama can really reach across the aisle to both parties.