"American Idol" -- Rigged ballotting?

Fox Television ^ | May 13, 2003 | TommyDale

[TommyDale]

Ordinarily, it is difficult to get through for a while, since everyone calls starting at 9:00 pm. Tonight, there was no dial tone in parts of the Raleigh, NC area. Well after 60 minutes, there is a "quick busy", meaning the telephone system is not working correctly. I continually received busy signals even after only dialing the '1'. How can the voting be tabulated fairly if people in the home city of Clay Aiken can't even cast their votes??

[JimVT]

Sure that's Johnny Ray before his sex change operation!

Dooby-dooby-doo......................

[Ben Bolt]

Now that is cheating Luis . Drive thru is not long term .

[Luis Gonzalez]

Ruben?

Pictured below, is the entire range of Ruben's stage persona.

Change hands and repeat...

[Fester Chugabrew]

"Clay deserves to win this competition. "

Tonight was the first time I ever heard three contestants, let alone watch much of the show. That Clay guy nailed it. Distinct style, great intonation. If I voted at all he would get it.

[Luis Gonzalez]

You got a crystal ball?

Two words for you...

Barry Manilow.

[TLBSHOW]

thanks!

[Texas Eagle]

You guys should take that act on the road.

I thoroughly enjoyed it. Maybe all those years of listening to Rush Limbaugh is having an effect on me. I'm finally starting to have more fun than a human being should be allowed to have.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Your expert opinion needed here.

[EscapedDutch]

Clay on the other hand can only lift one eyebrow while broadwayfying any given song.

JP

[discostu]

It's more fun near the beginning, the cattle calls are hilarious, with the judges (all of whom know what they're talking about, they've all been very successful in aspects of pop music) telling somebody they're no good and the person argues. Simon, who's also the producer of the show and a BIG dog at BMI the company that give the winner a contract, is amazingly brutal but usually right and can admit when he's wrong (for a while there was something wrong with the stage setup and he couldn't hear well, he watched the ep on tape and apologized for some of his comments the next day admitting things sounded much better than he'd heard).

Dr. Pepper is epidemic down here, came out of Waco Texas, just down the road by Southwestern measurement. I used to be an RC junkie but when I first got to Tucson it wasn't down here (that was the era when RC advertised how hard it was to find). Can is alright, it doesn't soak up that tinfoil taste like other sodas, fountain is better.

[oust the louse]

My man Rueben needs to shed a few.he would not be able to throw on a concert with his weight.he gets tired walking from behind the stage to his mark.Kimberly Locke has a beautiful face but the same problem with the weight thing.She also doesn't need to wear anymore of those tight pants.Clay on the otherhand has a fifth grade a$$ and a broadway voice.Nobody's perfect....Kim will win!

[Luis Gonzalez]

But he's got the pree-teen girls swooning.

[Luis Gonzalez]

We're split in this household, and cancelling each other's vote.

Wife votes for Kimberly, I picked Clay from the tryouts.

[MississippiMan]

I stopped watching after they canned the chick with the crimminal background.

They canned a guy (Corey) who didn't disclose an upcoming trial. Another girl with some kind of record (Trenyce) stayed because she did disclose hers. She was voted off a couple of weeks ago.

MM

[_Jim]

The switch starts routing the call as soon as you start dialing.

WEll, the dialed number starts getting examined ... no 'routes' (voice circuits) are set-up UNTIL all is clear to the far end (SAVES on toll circuit capacity remember?) ...

[MississippiMan]

I suspect Raleigh just overloaded the system. I watched it time-delay on the TiVo and started voting as soon as I was sure Clay was gonna be 03. Been dialing for two hours and never got through once. Wife got through ONE time. Go Clay.

One thing's for sure: The South kicked butt!

MM

[Scothia]

This just in: Water is wet, you can't brush your teeth with lemon juice, and reality shows aren't real. Details at 11.

[gg188]

The greatest. The kids on Idol should shut up and listen to Mr. S for a couple of weeks and learn how to sing. Vocal gymnastics does not equal singing. Mr. Sinatra could make one note so rich and so deep you could get lost in it. His singing was art, creativity and musicianship. Besides the fact he chose the great songs to sing. That's something else that would help the kids on Idol. They needed more Diane Warren songs to sing and fewer by most of the other songwriters who were featured. (BTW I have wathed IDOL most weeks but admit to losing interest after the eye candy---blonde Kim and Carmen---were voted off the island.)

[Ben Bolt]

Luis ..

If you are truly a man of compassion you would have bagged that name in a double sealed krypton tin foiled super sealed double wide zip lock bio waste disposal lead lined encased coffin .

[krunkygirl]

geeze, I liked Clay tonight (this is the first of this series that I watched--well, most of) and I thought his best performance of the night was his rendition of Mack the Knife...but then what do I know?