Perhaps Western civilization is in a post-decline phase, or maybe the decline is just taking a really long time, like the Roman Empire's did. The Romans had gladiators and Christian-hungry lions and that sort of thing. We have MTV.

Late-night television is like the cereal aisle in the supermarket: too many choices. Also, too many 'different' brands that really aren't different at all.

You don't hear TV cops griping because they have to enforce some Draconian law that shouldn't be on the books in the first place, or lamenting vindictive excesses in sentencing. Hollywood, supposedly a frothing cauldron of liberalism, has always been conservative on crime.

Crime dramas will never go away as long as people turn to television for, among other things, reassurance and comfort.

The perils of credit and debt, especially perilous in the computer age, have long been acknowledged in pop culture, but very infrequently by TV.

Perhaps Western civilization is in a post-decline phase, or maybe the decline is just taking a really long time, like the Roman Empire's did. The Romans had gladiators and Christian-hungry lions and that sort of thing. We have MTV.

In the 500-channel universe, which may, of course, contain many more channels than 500, the fun never stops - fun at such a fever pitch as to sometimes seem threatening, numbing, even agonizing.