As you sit back and dig into Season 7 of America Idol, know that there's a little scandal brewing about the number of contestants who aren't exactly what you'd call "undiscovered talent". Read the full article on Votefortheworst.com, the site that tried desperately to keep Sanjay in the running last year (and, as an aside, Sanjay doing a "It's 10pm, do you know where you children are?" promo for Fox REALLY creeped me out.)

According to them, at least 14 of the rumored 50 contestants going to Hollywood have previous professional experience as singers. The key offender is Carly Hennesy, pictured above, on the cover of her debut album. This is a girl who's had a deal, put out an album, made a video, and has been on Idol before - Season Five.

More tellingly, she seems to be a favorite of the producers, and has songs on her album written by songwriters who've also worked with - wait for it - Kelly Clarkson, Clay Aiken and Kimberley Locke. You start to smell a rat here?

It could be said "hey, what does it matter? All singers have a MySpace page and a video these days, some even have put out albums". But Idol is one of the most influential TV shows in America, and they seem to be planting artists on the show that they've worked with before and want to win. As VoteForTheWorst says:

So what’s wrong with this? Well, it’s forcing Idol to expose its hand as the premiere marketing tool for struggling artists. Instead of discovering the next big superstar, music executives are deciding who should be popular and getting them on to Idol. Many people watch American Idol because they think they can help make the next big music star out of an Everyday Joe or Jane. But Carly and her large number of has-been companions are merely failed artists who are being planted on the show by their sources to promote themselves. Would the hundreds of thousands of people who auditioned this year be happy to learn that their spot was given to someone who already had connections?

But that's not even the most blatant. What about Jermaine Paul (who made it to Hollywood but seemingly has since dropped out)?

The biggest plant of all, Jermaine was already signed to J Records (home of Clive Davis, he who signs most of the winning Idols) and was nominated for a Grammy for a duet with Alicia Keys on her second album. Alicia Keys is known as Clive Davis’s most recent pet project.

I can't believe I'm admitting this, but this actually makes me pretty angry. Where's my Prozac?