Jordin Sparks: Biggest Star in the Blogosphere

Seventeen-year-old
Jordin Sparks won the 2007 “American Idol” television singing contest
on Wednesday, beating an older, more offbeat Blake Lewis to become the
youngest ever winner of the coveted title.

Jordin Sparks grew up on “American Idol,” watching the show since
she was 12 years old and telling her mother it was what she wanted to
do. “Now I’m actually doing it,” the 17-year-old told reporters
backstage after winning the competition in Wednesday’s season
finale.

Yeah, Jordin won. Shocker.

But did you see Blake Lewis and Doug E. Fresh go absolutely crazy during their beatbox duet/duel?

Now that Dancing
With the Stars and American Idol are finally complete (and getting
through the two hour thickly padded finales was like pulling teeth), I
barely know what I’ll do with myself. The Amazing Race made it back to
the States and The Bachelor has found his true love. Howie Mandel is
polishing his pate for the summer and the National Bingo Game was lame.
I’d hate to have to spend my idol hours with Bill O’Reilly or Lou
Dobbs, so what’s a boy to do? HALLELUJAH! The fourth season of Hell’s
Kitchen starts on Fox June 4.

And I
confess I was one of millions who got caught up in the Sanjaya
phenomenon--fascinated by how he snubbed Idol conventions and flaunted
his notorious Mohowk updo,amused by Howard Stern's silly campaign to
use Sanjaya to discredit Idol, and the sweet taunting of Simon Cowell.
He became an emblem of something--a desire for something less
formulaic, more in-your-face, in a winner-take-all culture. And maybe
Sanjaya's success exposed how mediocrity, with a dose of flash, rises
to the top--in our culture as well as politics.

As conventional wisdom has it, the finale came down to the singer
vs. the entertainer, 17-year old Jordin Sparks vs beatboxing
20-something Blake Lewis. A record 74 million voted. (By the way, who's
making the big bucks off of the text-voting?) But to dissent from
conventional wisdom, I think Jordin Sparks won not only because she's a
talented singer, the youngest-ever finalist and winner, but she is a
woman who represents the demographic and geographic future of this
country. Her mother is white, her father is African-American. (I know
this differs from Obama's multiracial background, but the parallels are
there.) And breaking tradition--unlike all previous Idol winners,
Jordin doesn't come from the South. Instead, she's from Glendale, a
large suburb of Phoenix, Arizona--that Southwest region which has
become the repository of political hopes for those seeking to break the
GOP's grip on our politics. I'm pushing this, I know. But, hell, the
Idol season is over --so why not?