There's one fatal flaw to democracy. Since it takes time to research the issues, compare and contrast claims, hop in the car and drive to the polls, the vast majority of voting will be done by people who have absolutely nothing better to do.

College graduates? Busy. Corporate executives? Busy. Your grandma? Heck, she'll be at the polling place at 7 AM serving Ovaltine to her friends in line.

It's a sad fact that people whose daily plans include denture-clicking and shaking their bony fists at local youngsters have so much control over the world. This is why more politicians come out against gay rights than Medicare: because gay people are too busy making a living and building a social life to complain, while Grandma's had zero on her calendar since Mickey Rooney died. Mr. Politician isn't standing on principle: he just doesn't want to spend eight hours on the phone with a woman whose vocabulary consists solely of the words "Ya whippersnapper!" and "Whazzat you say?"

When American Idol offered one finalist from California and another from Arkansas, then, we could have predicted the result. California has six hundred Michelin-starred restaurants, twenty-six art museums, three Disney parks, and four Six Flags. Arkansas has a drive-thru Quiznos and the world's largest rubber-band ball.

Take a wild guess: the residents of which state had four hours to spend on the phone?

AT&T tells us this is exactly what happened. Almost a hundred million votes were cast last night, with 38 million coming from Arkansas alone.

More than a third of all the votes. From one state.

I hate to go out on a limb here, but I'll guess exactly zero of these folks thought, "I really enjoyed the gender-bending, envelope-pushing Adam's soulful interpretation of Tears for Fears' Mad World." Nope, we had half a million people think, "Hey, Kris! Kris Allen. The Krisster. Tha's ma boy! Hoo-WEE!" and hit the redial button with their PBR can.

If all this seems familiar, think back to election time. There's a suave, cool city dude in one corner, and a swaggering doof in the other. Kris knows he's got nothing going for him: heck, he only went to the audition to support his brother Dan. Like George W., you can see the fear in his eyes when his mouth moves faster than his brain. It looks like he has to concentrate to get both his eyes pointed in the same direction. He just sits back and lets himself get carried to the finish line by down-home folks who love the Lord and have nothing else to do.

So yup, it's no big win for democracy. We didn't get the qualified guy. We didn't get the talented guy. We got the regular guy. We got the church-going guy. Today they're putting up a "Mission Accomplished" banner in Kris' hometown. They're arranging a parade past the Dollar Tree, past where the Curves used to be. Of course, it'll be no vindication when Kris drops his first record and it lands with a thud. Because nobody cares about his singing. All that mattered was that he won.

The good news is, those of us with brains can commiserate. We can remind ourself talent endures while pretenders fade. We can thank our lucky stars that the Constitution only lets idiots vote once, or right now VP Sarah Palin would be urging Congress to dub tomorrow "Kick a Jew for Jesus!" day. Heck, even the American Idol producers seem to be on our side. Seconds before the show went black, they cut to Justin Guarini, a first-season finalist from Georgia. "Yo, bro!" Justin's thinking. "Hooray for the South! See you onstage in my dad's basement in about two weeks."