American Idol: The Outrage. What the hell happened? That was the worst thing ever on American Idol. See my post from this morning for how I read the show last night: I thought Jennifer was the best. I thought the three Divas would be the final three. They were the bottom three! How could that happen? Jennifer was my original favorite, from the first audition. I can only think that the strong praise for the Divas caused people to think they didn't need help, and people speed dialed for two hours for favorites they believed were in danger. I must say they really revealed the results dramatically, telling George to join the safe group, causing him to walk over to the Divas (forming a group that was my predicted final four: George and the Divas), then telling him he'd joined the wrong group. Oh, the outrage!

UPDATE: Prof. Yin was also shocked but questions whether this was actually the worst thing that ever happened on AI. The only serious contender for worst, in my opinion, is when Tamyra Gray didn't make the final three. But that was far from this bad, for several reasons. Her performance that week was really bad. And the remaining three had well-deserved fans. I especially liked Nikki McKibbin. I thought she had real style, and she sang more the sort of music I like. The night Nikki beat Tamyra, Tamyra sang a bad rendition of that dreadful Dr. Laura song "New Attitude" and a song I can't remember called "Feel the Fire." Nikki was at her peak doing "Mary Jane" and "I'm the Only One." Tamyra was better over the whole season, but Nikki beat her fairly that night.

Wait, wait, a cloud just lifted from my memory. There is one other contender for the worst thing ever on AI. It happened on tonight's show. It was that horrible ... thing... that thing... that ... that... that Barry Manilow song! What the hell was that? Some crap about freedom. He made me hate freedom!

The outrage about tonight in the Television Without Pity forum is over the top. (Sample page.)

FURTHER UPDATE: Wow, Shack at Television Without Pity deleted the board I just linked to, with the statement:

Jennifer was ejected. Comments that don't make ridiculously unfounded accusations of racism against the voters are welcome.

YET FURTHER UPDATE: Hudson herself voices the theory stated in the original post:

"I think people just take it for granted because it's Fantasia, Jennifer and LaToya, and we are the divas,'' she said ''They just assume we'd be fine so they decided to help out somebody else... and just left us hanging.''