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Barack Hussein Obama is the new President of the United States. Inauguration Day was ubiquitous on the nation's television screens all day and was almost the sole topic on the nightly newscasts. All three networks expanded their newsholes to accommodate the historic day: they each aired fewer commercials, courtesy of a single sponsor (Audi, the automaker, was the sole advertiser on all three newscasts); they each expanded their half-hour newscasts to 60 or 90 minutes (for consistency's sake Tyndall Report monitors just the regular first 30 minutes). The Story of the Day attracted 64 minutes of coverage (91% of the 70 min three-network newshole) as all three were anchored from the inauguration ceremonies in Washington DC.

ABC and NBC both had their anchors, Charles Gibson and Brian Williams, lead off their newscasts with a tick-tock of the day's events. An Episcopalian prayer service was followed by coffee at the White House with President George Bush, which was followed by a bungled Oath of Office on Capitol Hill, which was followed by an 18-minute Inaugural Address, which was followed by lunch inside the Capitol as the Bushes helicoptered away, which was followed by the Inaugural Parade along Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. CBS assigned the tick-tock to White House correspondent Chip Reid. "Chief Justice John Roberts misstated the Presidential oath," Reid pointed out, by calling the job President to the United States and misplacing the adverb faithfully. NBC's Williams explained that the Chief Justice "went without notes." ABC's Gibson diplomatically shared the blame: the Chief Justice and the President "never got quite in sync."


Andrew Tyndall 1/21/09 11:51:45 pm

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