Oprah and Tyra

How is it that Oprah has gained the power that she wields over millions of American women?

She has a book club, a magazine, a TV show, a diet program. She makes a huge amount of money but her show isn't much different than other daytime talk shows. She does a-day-in-the-life-of things like "Gay for 30 Days." She talks to people about eating disorders, domestic abuse, unruly children. She interviews celebrities. How is she different from Regis&Kelly?

Her magazine isn't a far cry from Women's Day or Real Simple or Redbook. Her diet programs are just as effective as Jenny Craig or Weight Watchers.

And the book club. Oprah has the power to sit and chastise a best-selling author and his publishing house. I think her book club is wonderful in that it promotes reading and supports book publishing. But I think she could do more with it. She could have the club read more books so that more titles would enjoy the skyrocketing sales her promotion guarantees. She could read different books - it seems like a lot of them are about substance abuse or physical abuse or disfunctional families. I hate the power she wields over the publishing industry.

I respect Oprah for the empire she's built. And she does a lot of great things. She has put herself far above other afternoon talk shows like Sally Jesse or Geraldo. I guess I just want more from her. And, she fell from grace a little with that grossly overblow James Frey thing. She came off as ridiculous.

Tyra Banks now has a talk show in the same time slot as Oprah. (Don't know what they were thinking, no one will ever top Oprah, ever!) As much as I love to hate Tyra on America's Next Top Model, I just hate her on her talk show. Or at least, on the bits of it I've seen.

One day, Tyra dressed in a fat suit and the whole show was about how no one paid attention to her and she was treated differently than she normally is. Duh.

This week, she had a report on why men go to strip clubs. Tyra went undercover as a stripper to find out. "So many women have written in to me with this problem," she said, "and we're going to get to the bottom of it today." Yes, Tyra, why oh why do men go to strip clubs?

Ugh.