Sesame Street Still Vital?

In January I attended a panel discussion on The Future of Children's Television. Fun stuff. I recall being particularly perturbed by the fact that a former Director of Children's Programming at PBS (who is currently the VP of Programming and Development for the Cartoon Network's preschool business), Alice Cahn, said that Barney was "the best thing to happen to children's television programming." Thinking about it still makes my eyeballs sweat.

Why did I go? I went, in part, because I wanted to know what went wrong with Sesame Street. I used to love that show, but somewhere along the line it lost its heart and soul.

Some people still cling to it, though. And perhaps it's still better than a lot of children's television programming out there today. Plus Strollerderby recently mentioned the following:

Sesame Street has a slew of pop-culture parodies lined up this season, including “American I,” “Meal No Meal,” “A’s Anatomy,” and “GNN: Letter in the News,” with Anderson Cooper (featuring grouch anchors Walter Cranky and Dan Rather-Not).

Anyone else a little worried about how exactly they're going to do "American I"? Nothing I'm coming up with sounds like something I'd place in front of a tot.

So a question for youse peoples. Who still watches this show and, if so, is it watchable?