Is it just me, part two.

Television and I grew up together. I was 5 before we had one. Up till then, I listened with my mother to the soap operas on the radio, Helen Trent, Ma Perkins and Young Doctor Malone, and to The Lone Ranger and Inner Sanctum at my grandparents house because my mother thought they were too scary. Stories on the radio are really wonderful, you know. My kids and stepkids found this out when we listened to them on Sunday nights coming home from grandma's house. Imagination can make them even more wonderful. But I digress. Early TV was incredibly creative, with personalities like Jack Paar, Ed Sullivan, Lawrence Welk, Steve Allen, Milton Berle, Sid Caeser, a whole plethora of sterling talents. Lucille Ball and Jackie Gleason came along, and Jack Benny morphed over from radio. George Burns and Gracie Allen, the list goes on, all super-people, larger than life. Since moving to town, I am once again watching network, no more Sopranos or Six Feet Under, and I really love reruns of Everybody Loves Raymond and Friends, and Judging Amy, wow. But what's with all this prime time "reality" crap? I mean, from a producer's point of view, it must be nice not to have to pay a stable of creative writers and talented actors, not to mention set designers and decorators. And why do that when you can get beautiful young stupid people to roll around nearly naked in chicken guts and eat live bugs for nothing. My question is: who is watching it? Who is ogling the Donald's really disastrous comb-over to endure the back-biting, back-stabbing tedium of corporate politics? Once, I read a science-fiction short story that predicted a world populated 99.9% by morons, because the smart people stopped procreating. Perhaps it has already descended on us, except in the short story, the remaining .01% were calling the shots. It looks like the powers-that-be have descended as well. Even BBC has better shows, tasteless, but far more creative. I'm at the point that I crave the return of the Western, and believe me, they were done to death. At least they were dramatic, and gave us Clint Eastwood, to boot.