There was a dream that was 'American Idol'. This is not it. This is not it!

{I had to print this article in its entirety instead of linking it. The Dallas Morning News is one of those annoying subscription based sites.}

Apparently, Spellbound Disciples, the two or three of you out there that watch ‘American Idol’ were led to believe that judges Simon Le Bon, Paula Ragu and Tito Jackson were actually in Austin screening contestants.

According to Dallasnews.com, they opted not to go in person due to the “fallout” from Hurricane Katrina.

In fairness to them, Austin was, like, completely obliterated by Hurricane Katrina [self-righteous, ironic smirk goes HERE]

Here's the article:

Idol in Austin? Not quite
04:46 PM CST on Friday, February 3, 2006
By MANUEL MENDOZA / The Dallas Morning News

There really is a place called Austin – in fact, auditions for American Idol were held in the Texas capital in October. Oh, they weren't?

Viewers of Wednesday's Idol episode were deceived to believe judges Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul and Randy Jackson were in the city by the lake after producers initially screened potential contestants last summer. But because of the fallout from Katrina, the Fox show decided not to return, instead flying the hopefuls they wanted to put in front of the judges to San Francisco, the network confirmed Friday.

The episode not only failed to reveal what really happened, but also went out of its way to imply the judges had gone to Austin to decide which contestants would go on to the next round. For instance, as footage of Mr. Cowell arriving somewhere other than Austin was played, a woman who didn't like him was shown running away from him – in Austin.

"Upon reflection, there should have been a line in the show" explaining that the second round of auditions were not held in Austin, a Fox spokeswoman said.

But in the weekly Idol conference call with the media, executive producer Ken Warwick said, "It wasn't a big deal."

"Clearly that didn't happen the way it [was shown]," he said. "We have to produce an entertainment program to begin with. We didn't mention it on the air, to be honest, because we thought it wasn't a big deal. ... It was not deliberately done to mislead anybody. We had nothing to gain by misleading people."