Someone please remove the soapbox from under Nonnan's feet

After some hesitation and a time shift, three major broadcast networks have agreed to carry Barack Obama's latest primetime news conference.

The event was announced Friday afternoon as Obama battles to bolster congressional support for an ambitious health-care overhaul while facing dropping approval ratings.

But broadcasters are struggling with falling approval ratings of their own; Nielsen's audience measurements show viewership in a summertime slump.

The conference will mark the president's fourth primetime press event since he took office six months ago. Such interruptions tend to wreak havoc with network schedules and can cost millions in lost advertising.

CBS, which airs only repeats that evening, agreed early Monday to cover the conference.

But for NBC, Fox and ABC, the decision was tougher. During a summer that's otherwise strewn with repeats, Wednesday includes all of their top-rated reality programs.

The report goes on to state that NBC was reluctant at first to carry the news conference, becasue the intended schedule (9 p.m. ET) conflicted with the networks reality show "America's Got Talent," which airs Wednesday nights at 9 p.m. Eastern. The White House then decided to change the time of the conference to get NBC to air it, one hour earlier, at 8 p.m.

Of course, Noonan bills the network's decision to air the conference as "The Final Degradation of American Government."

Mark, if you're so pissed off about this, then bitch to the big dogs at ABC, NBC, and CBS, you know, the ones who are going to televise the event to begin with, not the Obama White House. Furthermore, if Bush Jr. were still president, gave a news conference about who knows what, and one of the big three decided not to televise the event live, you and your traveling band of psychotic circus freaks would be on your collective soapboxes, bitching to anyone who will listen to you and scream that this is another case of that 'pesky liberal media trying to silence conservative viewpoints!', so please, spare me with your holier-than-thou bullshit, cause the only people listening to your rants are the freaks on your website and the imaginary voices in your head.