MANILA, Philippines—Some weeks ago, writing about the then upcoming “America Idol” championship finale, we predicted that it would end up as a musical duel between two Davids, 25-year-old Mr. Cook, and 17-year-old Mr. Archuleta—and wondered if viewer-voters would favor the former’s greater experience and versatility over the latter’s youthful appeal.

We weren’t sure because, in 2007, the title went to Jordin Sparks, who was also 17 years young at the time. Did this suggest that the voters would again say “yes to youth” in 2008?

Superior talent

It could well turn out to be—but, after weighing all of the factors, we decided to place our bet on superior talent, and went for Cook.

Last Wednesday, however, when the two Davids squared off in the tilt’s performance finals, we weren’t so sure anymore. —Especially, when judge Simon Cowell much too prematurely declared that Archuleta had dominated the final square-off, and in fact had even scored a “knockout.” Subjective talk like that can sway some voters, so last Thursday, when we turned in to the results show, we worried that Archuleta’s victory would indeed come to pass.

—That wouldn’t have been such a tragedy, because the younger David is talented and popular with the contest’s fans. We just felt that, everything considered, Cook was the more deserving winner. In any case, we prepared ourselves to see Cowell’s audacious and even presumptuous prediction come to pass.

But, what do you know? The show’s viewer-voters ended up saying “yes” to greater experience and versatility over the youth factor—and, by a significant margin of 12 million votes, crowned David Cook as the 2008 American Idol!

Host Ryan Seacrest further revealed that Cook had gotten 56 percent of the vote, as opposed to 44 percent for the runner-up—a clear mandate from the show’s millions of viewer-voters.

New record

—Make that gazillions. Seacrest also announced that this year’s total vote count had set a new record—in fact, it was 23 percent more than the previous high mark. The new record is a real humdinger: 97.5 million votes!

Since David Archuleta is clearly headed for a stellar singing career of his own, most everybody on “American Idol” is a winner this year—with the exception of Cowell, whose rash, brash “prediction” blew up in his face like a trick cigar.

Interestingly enough, shortly before the winner was announced last Thursday, Cowell apologized to Cook for his potentially preemptive prediction. Now, we don’t know if a little bird had tweet-tweet-tweetered the final verdict into his ear, so he wanted to soften his upcoming comeuppance—but the timing of his apology was, as we’ve said, interesting . . .

As for the results show itself, it was quite a mish-mash of this and that. Among the performing finalists, however, we noted special star shine emanating, aside from the two Davids, also from Syesha Mercado and Michael Johns. Watch out for them next year, as well!