Last week President George W. Bush made an appearance on NBC’s “Deal or No Deal.”

By appearance, I mean he joined the action via a taped message.

The show had 10 million viewers, which matched the show’s lowest Monday rating ever.

Bush was supporting Capt. Joseph Kobes, a U.S. Army transportation officer who served one tour of duty in Iraq before volunteering for a second and third tour.

Kobes ended up with $78,000 at the end of the game, although he was up to $144,000 at one point.

Bush, who is facing extremely low approval ratings, joked around in his message.

“I’m thrilled to be on ‘Deal or No Deal’ with you tonight,” Bush said.

“Come to think of it, I’m thrilled to be anywhere with high ratings these days. Howie, I don’t know if you’re free to come to Washington anytime soon, but I have to reach an agreement with Congress on the federal budget. How’d you like to host a $3 trillion ‘Deal or No Deal’?”

Gotta love the irony.

How pathetic that Bush has resorted to making appearances on television shows to “support” the troops.

After lying to us to get the war started, Bush is now riding out his final months in office.

All he is waiting for is to pass this ridiculous mess off to his successor.

This is how he spends his time?

He was even booed when he threw out the first pitch at the Washington Nationals’ opening day game.

So much for Bush being the politician most people would want to have a beer with.

Are Bush’s actions appropriate for a president? I think not.

This country is in need of some real leadership right now. Cutting “stimulus” checks is not what the president needs to be doing.

He should be working with the global community to help strengthen our economy or—gasp—work on ways to wean America off barrels of crude oil that cost $115-plus.

Oh wait, the people that are in charge of the oil companies are chums with the Republican Party.

I guess that’s what we’re going to see from Bush for the rest of his term.

He never appeared to take the presidential office seriously and that’s even more apparent now.

Just wait for some network to revive “The $64,000 Question” with Bush as the smug and trying-too-hard-to-be-witty host.

That’ll be the real ratings killer.