There is also a little box thing I found that you can connect to your monitor and it makes it into a TV.

[The TVBox 9 is a top of the line external TV Tuner with the ability to turn your LCD monitor into a TV without the use of a PC! Featuring cutting edge Progressive Scan technology and 3D-Motion Adaptive De-Interlace, the TVBox 9 displays sharper images while you enjoy full-screen SXGA high-resolution display (up to 1280 x 1024).]
http://www.aver.com/mpd/tvbox9_feature.html

Another option we might do -
buying a nice large monitor instead of a new digital TV { less cost & less power consumption} and use the TVbox9 thing.

You can search the energy star website to find out power use/ratings etc.
http://www.energystar.gov/

monitors 26"-32" use about 30 - 50 watts while on
similar sized TV use 124- 170W watts while on