Do you remember when winning a million dollars on a game show actually meant something? People flocked to ABC by groups of 30 million or more to watch Regis Philbin ask some poor person 15 questions for a million dollars. Even mediocre copycat game shows like Greed, Winning Lines, and Twenty-one hopped on the bandwagon with mild success. Those days are now gone. Who wants to be a millionaire? Apparently, everyone does and now it's very easy to do so. In the past 24 hours, two game shows have given away a million dollars. One was with great fanfare. 40 million people saw "Joe Millionaire" Evan Marriott finally admit to Zora that he has not inherited $50 million and instead, must rely on his underwear model looks to find the woman of his dreams. Miraculously, Zora is happy with his looks and his, ahem, personality, and wants to continue the growing relationship. The money shot for Fox though never occurred. The big news was met with tepid reaction, not even a jaw drop. Then the butler walks in with a check for a million dollars. Really, that simple huh? Live in the lap of luxury pretending to be a millionaire in front of 20 women, going through the task of picking the right lady and then getting a million dollars yourself? I tell ya, once the money has been blown, the relationship is off.

The second show with a big winner was the original one, Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, now relegated to a syndicated spot and hosted by Meredith Vieira. The first winner, IRS guy John Carpenter, won with the whole country watching and now another guy has won a million dollars, and America barely blinked. We were still talking about Joe Millionaire or shouting about Iraq in some anti-war protest. The lucky guy's name is Kevin Smith (such a popular name), a truck driver from Los Angeles. The million dollar question was "The U.S. icon Uncle Sam was based on Samuel Wilson, who worked during the War of 1812 as a what?" After another read of the question, Smith correctly answered a meat inspector. I wonder what's harder, living a lie for a month or answering 15 questions. Which ever it is, they're both worth a million dollars.