re: The destruction of "24"
Okay, I'm a bit out of my depth here, since I've never watched the show either, and all I know about it is from a couple of my conservative/libertarian friends and what I've read about it.
One conservative blogger has his own opinion, and his is that the writing went downhill last season. Again, that's just an opinion.
But if you read the WSJ article, every comment made about why the ratings have gone down is pretty much an opinion. So I guess the proof will be if giving Jack Bauer a ponytail and a Peace Corps assignment cranks the ratings back up again. If they tank even worse...