Call it a cry for help, in more ways than one. Hoping to bolster ratings for an awards show that has been steadily losing viewers for years -- and which this year is based on a TV season completely wrecked by Hollywood labor troubles -- the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences decided to sweeten Sunday's telecast with a special award: the most dramatic TV moment of all time. Twenty nominees were selected by a ''blue-ribbon panel,'' and viewers were allowed to vote online.

Here's the hilarious irony: Of the 16 TV shows that were nominated, 10 of them never won an Emmy for best drama. This is a truly impressive list of snubs: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dallas, Dynasty, Grey's Anatomy, Little House on the Prairie, Miami Vice, Moonlighting, Star Trek, The Twilight Zone and The X-Files.

If that list doesn't convince you that the Emmys are silly, pointless and driven by the hopeless vagaries of Hollywood politics rather than any artistic standard, then you're probably blind and stubborn enough to be an Academy voter. Just remember to vote for Charlie Sheen in every category, and you'll do fine.

Even more mysterious to me than why anyone in Hollywood pays any attention to an award with such a thoroughly lame track record is why Miami Herald editors make me write about it every year. They apparently think that somehow, some day, I'll break down and say something nice.

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