A picture paints a thousand words.

Right. I marked it with "OVERPIMPED," so I guess the picture just speaks nine hundred and ninety-nine. But I swear, this is how David Cook will always look to me: SCREECHING.

Am still furious about last night's pimping. Come on. Since when has "I don't wanna miss a thing" been one of the greatest songs of all time? Sure, if it only had "Mary Had A Little Lamb" to compete with. Screw you, Simon. And you too, Nigel, who, according to a report, was seen jumping up and down with joy after Cook's overpimped screeches... Er yeah, performance. Or so they called it.

The more I watch Cook and Syesha and yeah, Brooke White as well, the more I'm convinced that they really work hard to affect a certain effect. White nods too often it looks so fake, Cook tries to smile but ends up smirking, and when he bows his head in acknowledgment it's as plastic as Barbie dolls made by Mattel, and Syesha swaying her hips is an annoyance. I liked all of them better when they were just, you know, natural. Struggling with words whenever they were asked, as though they hadn't practised or imagined that moment.

But yeah, Syesha and White are history, and I'm supposed to be bashing Cook in this post. Yeah, Cook and his screeches for the past couple of weeks. I refuse to pay to have somebody yell at me, thank you very much. If that's music to people, then I'd prefer silence. And really, comparing him to Daughtry. I've heard the much talked about Daughtry (finally), and hello, there is no comparison. No comparison whatsoever. Daughtry is like, his own style personified, and Cook sounds like what majority of the rockers sound like, I suppose he'll fade into somewhere sometime soon. Well, sooner than most people expect anyway.

But hey, he's already 25, so I'd say give him a chance. LOL. I guess I should stop bashing Cook right here, right now, lest I have another word war with a friend or a family member or classmate or whoever. I welcome differences in tastes, you know. Hell, I couldn't care less if you don't think Britney Spears stinks. But with that openmindedness that I espouse, I expect the same level from people I meet. Would I be bashing Cook, or anybody else, for that matter, if people had not first attacked and dressed down David Archuleta, who I am a fan of?

So yeah, this is a shoutout to all the David Cook fans (including family members who annoyed me so much I wanted to hex them into oblivion) I've fought with over the last gew days, who are supposedly older than me and more intelligent and more mature than my twenty years of existence.

Grow up, and stop bitching around.

David Cook can take home the crown, for all I care. Our David doesn't need it, endless hours of promotions and stuff and having to put up with Nigel.

May you be the American Idol, David Cook. Amen. Rascal from notingDavid.org, a David Archuleta fan, is also rooting for you.

In many ways, David Cook is the ideal American Idol. He’s familiar, he’s predictable, he fits easily into a predefined genre with which everyone is quite comfortable. Because the scope of his professional character is already delineated the additional branding of American Idol won’t succeed in fully defining him. But perhaps most important, he’ll make people feel as though they’re choosing something a bit rebellious when in fact they’re choosing the most conventional contemporary archetype of them all."

The real rebel in this competition is David Archuleta. David fits no mold whatsoever, and that’s precisely why the press has had such difficulty trying to explain and categorize him (definable buckets being the critical workaround to having to characterize something truly original). Oh, the critics have tried glibly to pigeonhole David as a Disney type or a Christian singer or a boy-band figure, and there are perhaps elements of all of these in him, but none define him with any real measure, not the way the simple moniker of “rocker” defines David Cook.


Our David is a indeed study in character. He's that "unflappable reay of sunshine," with a smile that just doesn't want to quit and gloriously illuminated with a pearly light that, as one reporter has said after being in his presence, made her a believer. But I've always believed that he has this hidden steel, of which we caught a glimpse when he defended his song choice when he sung "You're the Voice". Amidst all the rumours that been plaguing him since he started on AI, especially about his supposed stage dad, he has kept his manners, remaining pleasant and choosing to ignore the media hounding him.

"Don't you trust us?" a journalist was said to have asked Archuleta.

"Never trust the media," our David answered, and that was the second time we've seen how mature and how smart Archuleta is, despite his normally shy demeanour and his stuttering onstage.

This week, with the news that his father's backstage pass has been revoked, our David has finally spoken up in his father's defense... Without the famous giggles, the stumbling around words, the fidgeting of hands. Directly and steely, Archuleta can be quoted as saying, "I'm 17! I think I can stand up for myself if I want a glass of water."

Amazing kid. He doesn't need to win the title, but he must win. I'd want him to win just to that smile on his face and just to put all the haters, the critics and the cynics in their place and prove to everybody that yes, even with the wickedness gaining momentum over creation, untainted good can still exist, in the voice of a seventeen-year-old boy who uses his gift in a mission to serve.

I wish I can find words eloquent enough to explain why I, who has never cared much for reality shows or for television, for that matter, has carved a part of my life supporting and defending Archuleta. But I can't. Words fail me, and I suspect even pictures will.