The fault is in our stars, dear Brutus: not the glass screen through which we see them.

Somewhere around the turn of the century, it stopped being hip to say you never watched TV. Adults are much more likely to find something to engage them on television than they are at the local multiplex. Edges are being cut on television all the time, but at the movies only now and then.

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.

If the networks can get audiences to tolerate pop-up promos by the dozens, maybe they'll start selling pop-up commercials, too.

Obviously neither 'American Idol' nor 'Dancing With the Stars' is a variety show in the classic sense, but the way they incorporate elements of drama, comedy and suspense is moderately ingenious.

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.

A fellow with the inventiveness of Albert Einstein but with the attention span of Daffy Duck.