Dearest Santa:

We all know this is a busy time for you – what with figuring
what size lump of coal to leave for Joe Lieberman and returning all the Tiger
Woods memorabilia people decided they didn’t want.

But I’ve got a few
requests on behalf of the entire TV industry. If you could find a way to make
these little things happen, we would have such an amazing new year in
television. And you might save a little cash on coal in 2010.

Cut Jay Leno
back to three days a week…or less – Assuming his ratings don’t spike at
Christmas when everything else is in reruns or holiday specials, Leno is about
to sink quality free TV, sending viewers to cable and soaking up the network’s
10 p.m. timeslots. Why not encourage NBC to cut him back to days when his show
is most popular or does the least damage – say Monday Wednesday and Fridays --
get Law & Order: SVU back to 10 p.m. and find some scripted shows worth
watching.

Flash forward to a fix for Flash Forward – ABC’s sci fi drama
started so promisingly with a whiz-bang episode featuring almost everyone on
earth passing out and having a vision of the future. But it has since sunk,
mired in cheesy dialogue (too many characters tell you when something important
just happened to make sure you understand it) and too many episodes where the
core story doesn’t advance. Now on a break until March, perhaps the show could benefit from a stronger vision for its own future.

Give Glee’s Jane Lynch a Golden Globe, SAG award, Emmy gold and anything
else she wants – The, ahem, lynchpin of Fox’s infectious dramedy about the
world’s wildest glee club deserves every award in the book. Her ruthless
cheerleader coach/villain Sue Sylvester turns out to have a disabled sister she
loves, a heart broken by a cheating boyfriend and a past as a centerfold model.
Let’s see Emmy magnet Tina Fey try something like that.

 Do not give a
reality show to the Salahis, the Heenes or another Gosselin – The moment a
fame-seeking nutcase actually scores a TV series from a dangerous publicity
stunt, the floodgates will open. Child services and the Secret Service may never
recover.

Help Jon Gosselin strike a blow for every reality TV pawn – Yes,
the Jon and Kate Plus 8 star is a conscienceless worm who blames everyone else for
his bad choices. But if he manages to weasel out of the contract TLC made him
sign when he was stuck with eight kids and Kate, then reality TV “stars”
everywhere can escape the indentured servitude networks require. Free
Gosselin!

Keep Hulu.com from charging for access – How else will I catch up
with shows I’m too busy to watch live and don’t care enough about to record on
my DVR?

Give journalists a break - and a new revenue stream or two -- 2009 was not the best year for journalists. There were 68 of us killed this year, the most ever (just under half from one massacre in the Philippines). Additionally, 15,000 of us lost jobs this year, thanks mostly to the hobbled economy and disintegrating advertising model. And something like 142 newspaper stopped publishing in 2009, also a modern milestone.