'Idol' Shocker! Another Truth Bared!

Aparticipant in a CBS competition series once worked as a stripper at a club in New York City, performing for its mostly male clientele!

Oh, sorry, wrong file. That was Gypsy Rose Lee, a "What's My Line?" panelist off and on between 1950 and 1967.

Let's start again:

A participant in an NBC competition series once worked as a stripper at a club in New York City, performing for its mostly male clientele!

Drat, still the wrong file -- Gypsy Rose Lee again, only this time on "Hollywood Squares" in 1968 and '69.

Ah -- here's the one we're looking for:

The Associated Press reports that a participant in Fox competition series "American Idol" once worked as a stripper at a club in Phoenix, performing for its mostly male clientele!

In its article, the River City Ladies Auxiliary Dance Committee, er, the Associated Press, further writes that David Hernandez has never -- that's right, never! -- been referred to on the "Idol" competition as a stripper or former stripper.

No word on whether Hernandez ever read Chaucer, Rabelais or Balzac.

Furthermore, the AP wrote, astonishment wafting from the page, a "person close to the show who is not authorized to comment publicly and asked not to be identified" says there are no plans to remove Hernandez from the competition "despite the semifinalist's past."

The Fox network -- great guys but lacking the broader vision -- refused to comment, saying only, "We don't comment on the personal lives of the show participants."

But "Idol" Executive Producer Ken Warwick was scheduled to be interviewed by TV Guide for a cover story the day the Stripper Scandal broke and was quizzed on Hernandez's r¿sum¿.