Sheees Baaack!

Flirtatious: "This forecast if for you, and you alone."

Real Mood: Perplexed

P:rediction: "No other woman to be on air at CNN will ever again spell her name J A C Q U I!"

 

I need to be journalistically pure in this situation. This is a picture of Jacqui Jeras who disappeared from the CNN cameras  for more than a week. But what you are seeing is their web site promotional picture of Jacqui. That's why I cropped it so you don't confuse her publicity outfit ,with today's on air outfit.  I missed getting that on air picture because the battery died on my camera. (I probably would have been fired for that if I was still on somebody's payroll.)

Anyway, she is back with no explanation of what happened to Bonnie Schneider, who, herself appeared out of nowhere.

Today, Jacqui was wearing a red, almost Burgundy pant suit. I would call it an uneventful selection.  By comparison to outfits she and Bonnie have been wearing, I'd call it non-impactive.  Her reappearance raises a number of questions, which if they have answers, will break some industry molds.

Okay, here's some speculation that would make sense in other work worlds. Job Sharing? That's never done among anchors during a rating's period. It's presumed viewers will only remain loyal if the anchor that's supposed to be there, is there. It's in all their contracts. No time off during ratings. Anchor Adele Arakawa expressed it well to one of my classes, "about the only valid time off excuse during ratings? Death! Yours!"

Let's move on. Maybe it's a chance to have an audience focus group evaluate the relative magnetism of the two women. Not during ratings. While the fashion parade by the two women would fit "that makes sense" category?  Not during ratings. 

Maybe the change to Bonnie had been scheduled all along. We just witnessed the subtle changing of the weather guard? "You don't change horses in the middle of the stream."

Middle of Stream=Ratings

No personnel changes during ratings. .

Maybe CNN was in contract negotiations with Jacqui that fell apart. Bonnie had just been sitting in the wings waiting for those talks to collapse. Bonnie steps in and steals the show. She also steals Jacqui's lover.  Makes for some nice 40's film drama. Not during ratings.

Something else that makes no historical sense. If  have somebody new coming on the air, particularly during ratings, you promote the H___ out of them. I've not seen a single promo spot for either woman.

The only speculation that comes even close to being possible in my mind?One or both of these women share DNA with a major CNN stockholder. But since CNN is now owned by AOL, which is owned by Time Warner; getting DNA samples from that many executives is going to take some time. And the thought of nepotism at such a high level is so cynical, I don't even want it to be true.

I'm going to leave it for now and do some digging. If and when I get an answer, you'll find it here.    

 

In the meantime, "Welcome back Jacqui."

In my old radio days, top 40 station KOMA, Oklahoma City assigned names to airshifts. Disc Jockeys would come and go, but names remained the same.

When asked to come up with my first fake air name, I picked my and my dad's middle names. I became Paul Joseph. It had quite an impact, but one you might not imagine. In this small town it put an end to Jewish jokes until someone let the cat out of the bag. It was a lot of fun watching bigots squirm.

Night!