President Who? Network Morning Shows Give 55 Seconds to Bush Farewell

The three network morning shows on Friday almost totally skipped any coverage of President Bush's farewell address to the country on Thursday. Despite having a combined eight hours of air time, NBC's "Today," CBS's "Early Show" and ABC's "Good Morning America" devoted only 55 seconds total to reporting on Bush's speech. Instead, important topics such as "Obama thongs" and cheddar biscuits were highlighted.

Over a period of two hours, "The Early Show" ignored the speech entirely. "Good Morning America," which has a similar running time, allowed a mere 17 seconds. The "Today" show, which now encompasses four hours of broadcast time, provided the most with 38 seconds of information about the address.

None of the three programs featured any clips of Bush's farewell. (In contrast, on March 19, 2008, the day after then-presidential candidate Barack Obama's speech on race, these same shows allowed nine and a half minutes of sound bites of the Democrat.)

Over on GMA, co-host Robin Roberts and others spent over four minutes cooking bacon and cheddar biscuits with Emeril Lagasse. Additionally, co-host Diane Sawyer discussed whether Obama had the right dancing moves for the inaugural dance.

Finally, the "Early Show," which had zero coverage of Bush's speech, featured two Obama related segments, one on patriotic arts and crafts and a second on a Harlem school that will be having a group of children perform at Barack Obama's inauguration.

[Some of us consider it to have been a long 8 years since 2000 - but longer than they've been for George? Despite my profound disappointment in the man on more than one issue, I consider his overall treatment to have been deplorable and frankly a national embarrassment. I think overall we were lucky to have him, vs. the alternatives, given his success at the single most pressing danger we faced during his term. I wish him well, as all Americans should.]

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Here is the text of President Bush's "Farewell Address to the Nation" on Thursday, as prepared for delivery

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