Predictions for 'Too Close to Call' Idol Finale

Tonight’s American Idol showdown between glitzy Adam Lambert and down-home Kris Allen is too close to call, Rolling Stone reports. With both contenders performing ably at last night’s performance show—and a “Glamb-Slide” thus averted—it’s up to the viewers, whose wishes will be televised tonight. Ahead of the result, some ideas about who will—or should—win:

• NPR's Marc Hirsh doesn't deny Lambert's talents, but thinks an Allen victory would make for better TV. "If Allen were to win [tonight], in fact, it would retroactively make the entire season far more interesting," Hirsh writes. It would "would justify the season as solid television."
• But an informal New York Daily News poll of political strategists paints the contest as a red state/blue state contest that Lambert will win on a technicality. "It depends on who texts," one consultant said. "And my feeling is that more of those people are Adam's."  

(More American Idol stories.)