No News IS Good News!

      
       This is one of those days when, as far as
I'm concerned, No News IS Good News!
       Election Days, Primary and General, are
the two days I miss working in News least of
all! I tried to explain this to a gentleman who
just smiled and seemed to listen as I expressed
my thoughts the other day.
       I explained if you're lucky you'll have an
interesting breaking story to eat up your time.
You know, a corruption arrest or indictment or,
perhaps, a big drug bust.
       If not you can bet your bottom dollar you'll
be stuck assigned to a "Voter Turnout" story in
which you'll check a couple random polling
places and throw out some numbers, which usually
mean absolutely nothing to most people in the
audience.
     You'll do the same story, perhaps with a few
new numbers, on the morning, Noon, and evening
Newscasts.
     And then you find yourself going "Live" from
some candidate's "Victory Party." But except in a
very cases, it's far too early to know if it will truly
be a "Victory Party" since the polls are still open
and you have no actual results!
     Speaking of results, you wait for them in some
central location and quickly learn there's no "quick"
involved in getting them!
     But that won't matter to your Producers who will
come to you for another "Live" report whether you
have something new to report or not!
     Finally, when the results are known, you'll be
searching for the winning and losing candidates for
their reaction. The winner will be surrounded by a
loud cheering crowd that has the potential to destroy
your hearing and drown out any statement he or she
makes if they actually get anywhere near your
microphone.
     The loser will generally remain hidden as long as
possible and will not time his or her appearance to
coincide with your broadcast deadline.
     Of course many times you won't know the actual
winner and loser until late at night or even until the
next day....if then!
    As I explained to my good listening but quiet friend,
it's a lot of work for a very little bit of information all
too many people care little about!
     I'm much happier staying home watching anything
that isn't filling the bottom of my screen with a steady
flow of numbers explaining how many precincts have
reported.
    I think my friend agreed. But he just sat there smiling.
    Maybe he knows more than he's saying!?
    Hope you did your part by voting and that all your
NEWS is good!