exactly

That sucks that Maria is gone. I really thought she would be in the finals.

Ditto. The female population obviously voted more for William and Donald, thus taking away votes from Maria who was clearly the better dancer.

This has been DWTS problem since week one. Remember Rachel Hunter? She was the first person eliminated in the history of the show. Received a 26. Got booted the next night. Hot model, but if you have a messy divorce from Rod Stewart you won't get many votes from the female fans.

Its the female fans that have been going gaga over William and Donald all season that were Maria's downfall. A complete tragedy.

Okay, but then who's voting for Jenkins? Why would women vote for Jenkins but not Menounos? Does not make any sense.

You have to realize that some things just don't make sense. Katherine Jenkins was in the bottom two last week, but was saved this week. Maria was never in the bottom two up till last night. The votes just can't be swayed that much. It just brings up the question "Is there a little funny business involved" when talking about the voting. So many questions and conspiracy theories can be attributed to last nights vote.

So, there was some sort of conspiracy to get rid of Maria? Get real. She was in the judges' bottom two last week, but the voter's decided to finally boot Roshon instead.

Also, keep in mind that the difference between first and last with the judges this week was just 1.3% (three points out of the 230 awarded) so it didn't take much for the public to completely reverse things.

Who knows why the viewers voted the way they did and who knows how close it may have been (since ABC doesn't reveal the popular vote)? The producers would probably suggest that unpredictable voting patterns just add to the drama.

BTW, I don't think the Rachel Hunter comparison is valid, since a point system was used the first two seasons, not the actual percentages of judges points/public votes.

The voters don't vote to boot people off. They vote for whoever they want to stay on, for whatever reason. It's the couple with the least votes that get booted off. With only 3 couples, the short end of the stick went to Maria & Derek. Because the other 2 couples were better dancers? I highly doubt that.

Don't the judges have any say?

Carlito: Your point is a good one--the vast majority of the voting is "pro-", although I'm fairly certain there's always some "anti-" . . I wonder if some of Maria's supporters were so sure of her being safe that they didn't bother to vote.

ACW: The judges get their say on Monday and those three weeks where they decided which of the bottom two to save.