For some reason, my exhortations for one athlete or another to catch the damn ball or for a manager to take the stupid pitcher out of the game almost always go unheeded.

"Daddy does know they can't hear him ... doesn't he?" my children will ask each other in hushed tones. This is usually followed by their muttering about the merits of this nursing home or that one.

Lately, I'm afraid, I've also taken to bellowing at the "experts" on the Sunday-morning political talk shows.

The first thing I notice about these characters is that they all dress a lot better than I do. I'm certain they all know their tailors by their first names.

I only know mine by his initials — J.C.

But enough about Mr. Penney.

I really don't mind their superior wardrobes. It's their superior attitudes that really get to me while they smugly chat with Mr. Stephanopoulos or Mr. Blitzer or Mr. Hume or Mr. Russert.

Last Sunday had me giving the TV an earful (which was silly given that cable replaced our set's rabbit ears a long time ago). The "experts" were discussing how good the economic numbers have been recently and wondering how come that hasn't translated into support for President Bush.

The latest Zogby poll has 30 percent of the voting populace citing the economy as their top issue, and those folks favor Sen. John Kerry over the president, 54 percent to 35 percent.

This got the pundits talking to themselves and — even worse — to us. They just couldn't seem to understand how that could be, given all the latest statistics.

As best I could figure, they had three basic bits of wisdom.

1. "With everything going on in Iraq, Bush just hasn't been able to get his message out about how good the economy really is."

2. "The voters are ignorant and apathetic because it's only May and the election isn't until November."

3. "It beats the living hell out of us."

Beating the living hell out of them was certainly tempting the more I listened. After a while, I began berating the television.

"What is the matter with you people?" I ranted. "When was the last time you bought a gallon of gas? It costs two dollars! TWO DOLLARS!"

I want to throw a brick through the TV screen every time one of those three-piece suits who probably drives a Mercedes tells us that isn't a lot to pay for gas.

"When was the last time you bought a gallon of milk, you effete morons? THREE DOLLARS AND 18 CENTS! FOR A GALLON OF MILK!"

(Truth be known, I don't begrudge the dairy farmers getting a decent price for their milk products. After so many rough years, they deserve anything they can get. However, most of the profit always seems to go to the middle man.)

"What about if your child needs to see a doctor?" I shout. "Sure, your kids have health-care coverage, but millions and millions of voters' kids don't!"

The pundits ignore me, just like the sports people I yell at. But the fact is, the "experts" just don't get it.

When you're a working stiff with no idea how you're going to fill your car up with gas or your child up with milk, you couldn't care less about the producer price index, consumer price index, consumer confidence level or the latest pronouncement from Alan Greenspan about the Fed raising interest rates.

You don't breathlessly follow the four-week moving average of unemployment applications when you're a single-mom checking the want-ads to see whether Wal-Mart's hiring part-timers who need to supplement the family income.

All you know is that your kids think it would be nice on a hot summer day to go out and get an ice cream cone, and you know that small cones for a family of four could cost you nearly 10 bucks.

That's what the TV pundits can't seem to understand. Americans don't care about statistics that indicate they should be content when they are clearly not.

Americans care about feeding their families, affording a tank of gas, being able to see a doctor when they need to, and how out-of-control tuition costs threaten to keep their children from attending college.

And yet, the pundits blather on about the politics of the latest economic figures and ignore the way real people struggle to make it from paycheck to paycheck.

I tell you, it's enough to make a person scream.

———

Sam Pollak is editor of The Daily Star. He can be reached at (607) 432-1000, ext. 208 or spollak@thedailystar.com.