The Weatherman Blues

Years ago, a buddy of mine was running a nightly newscast in a major media market.  His news program was coming in third place rating period after rating period.  Of course, that brought comfort to his counterparts who were producing the other two newscasts.  However, for him — all it brought was an upset stomach. Something had to give.  So what did they do?  They fired their most prominent news personality — the slightly eccentric weathercaster.  I asked, “Hey he was the guy who you promoted like nobody’s business but now you drop him like a hot rock — what gives?  My friend replied, ”We wanted the viewers to know that we were serious about changing our newscast and the most visible way of doing that was firing the weather man.”  Ratings began to climb.

I started to think about that story when I noticed that the latest average approval ratings for the United States Congress was at 19% approval and 75% disapproval.  That’s a 56% difference.  (The oft-mentioned low marks for the President are 31% and 65% for a 34% difference.)

With low ratings like that, the voters can act as station managers and begin canning the big names that seem to be working but are actually the reason for the low ratings.  (A certain junior Senator from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts seems to fit the bill.)

Seriously, though — It’s apparent that there is a great deal of frustration with those who are in power.  It’s palpable.  However, I’m not buying into the fact that it’s just the GOP that’s going to suffer in November.  I think all the incumbents are liable for a tumble.  John Kerry has the dubious task of reminding people what he did for the last 24 years (nothing positive springs to mind) rather than say what he’s going to do for us in the next six years.  He certainly cannot make a compelling case as to why he — unlike Jeff Beatty — must be the Senator.  He’s had his 24 years and I’m sure they’ll name a lovely bridge after him when all is said and done.  But he has to learn that he’s part of the problem not part of the the solution.

As someone else said, you don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing.