Simon Cowell's X Factor tries to silence The Voice

The timing of Simon Cowell announcing his rather lackluster judging panel for the American debut of The X Factor debuting on FOX this fall is convenient. The smug British bastard is a master of timing, publicity and manipulation. While still at the helm of American Idol, he shook things up with the departure of the constantly drunk Paula Abdul and the addition of Ellen Degeneres and that other woman whose name nobody can remember (Karen Dioguardi).

Apparently d Paula Abdul was ditched from Idol a couple years back for no other reason than for her to be a free agent when it came time for Cowell to Americanize The X Factor. But with a judge panel consisting of record producer L.A. Reid, British X Factor  judge Cheryl Cole who is a nobody here in the states and experienced judge and laughingstock Paula Abdul, The X Factor seems rather bland. Where's the gimmick? At least NBC's The Voice has blind auditions and "mentors" (Blake Shelton, Cee Lo Green, Adam Levine and Christina Aguilera) who area t least recognizable names to the target audience. While I don't expect The Voice to do even remotely well when it premieres tomorrow (Tuesday) at 8 PM C/T on NBC, I don't think the announcement of Cowell's latest batch of judges is going to seal its fate.

Both shows are essentially the same and they both are copies of American Idol which itself is a hyped-up version of Star Search done in the vein of a classy karoake competition. If I want to see people singing along to songs I already know, I'll stroll a few blocks and catch karoake night at the neighborhood bar. But if I want to see carbon copies of singing shows, I'll watch both American Idol and The X Factor because from an outsider's perspective they are both the same and both shows are utter garbage. Hell, even the local county fair has a singing contest and at least there I don't have to witness smug pricks past their prime judging the singing.

If I had a gun to my head and had to choose, I'd say that NBC's The Voice has the edge when it comes to originality but it also has a significant handicap -- it's on NBC. If I had to choose one of the three to watch, I'd put a bullet in my TV and finally admit that TV has run its course as a viable form of entertainment.

The British have a sense of humor about Kate Middleton

What happens when someone finds a piece of food which resembles the image of someone famous? They sell it of course. But 500 British pounds (about $13,500 U.S. dollars - just try and doubt my math) doesn't sound like an exorbitant amount for a jelly bean whose mottled coloring resembles the likeness of the future princess of England, Kate Middleton. Sure, it doesn't feature her bust (which would definitely increase the asking price because everyone loves breasts) but the best part about the fluff piece of journalism, which The Independent recognized as such, is the URL which the assigned the article... utter-PR-fiction-but-people-love-this-shit-so-fuck-it-lets-just-print-it-2269573

That's seriously what the URL is. Click thru and see for yourself or just stay here and look at the jelly bean image of Kate Middleton who, according to some supermarket tabloids I saw on Saturday is pregnant. That announcement will supposedly come after the wedding.

Do people really care about THIS royal wedding?

In case you're still obsessed, some thirty years later, about the modern day royal wedding happening a mere month away, worry not. Americans can obsess over the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton with 20 hours of combined coverage spread over NBC, MSNBC, E! and a few other cable nets nobody really gives a damn about.

The real question, though, is whether people do actually care about this royal wedding? The previous royal wedding was big news because it was the first of its kind due to it being televised and the soon-to-be Princess Diana being a virtual nobody and coming from nothing. She used her fame, though, for good and made a lasting legacy with her charity work.

The whole Kate Middleton thing seems different. Oh, sure, she's easy on the eyes but she's already at least somewhat famous and seems to be just a lesser version of our American fame whores -- the difference being that she has an accent which makes being a fame whore a bit classier.

I can wish until I'm blue in the face but I already know that people will obsess over  the Prince William/Kate Middleton nuptials just like any other wedding but do we need it to be televised? Hasn't Prince Charles done enough to sully the mystique of the British royal family to the point that we don't/shouldn't care any longer? Maybe we've finally moved on because we sure seem to be able to obsess plenty over stateside nobodies like Lindsay Lohan and her drug addiction/shoplifting habit and Charlie Sheen generally being a walking corpse who survives on a constant flow of porn star sex and cocaine.

This just in: Brits are drunks

Just how much whiskey does the average British adult consume in a year's time?

37 bottles.

I thought that I had a fondness for whiskey and that a few of my friends can toss back the whiskey as well but to be British and live up to that statistic must actually hurt.

Sure, not every adult in merry old England enjoys the sour mash to that extent but imagine those who make up for the Brits who don't. Damn.

If you thought that the dental condition of Brits was bad, just imagine their livers. To illustrate just how much whiskey that breaks down to, imagine tossing back three pints of beer each day fo an entire year. Not just any beer though, and definitely not that namby pamby crap that passes as beer for you and me. We're talking the beer that has honest to God hops in it. The beer that may need to be chewed.

Now go drink three pints of the strongest lager you can find, and do it on a daily basis, and you'll be on par with those supposed pansy-ass Brits.

Or if wine is your thing, get drinking because simple math equates that to 189 bottles of vine-grown spirits annually.

Suddenly I feel inferior. The British are better at something than us.