Man, wouldn’t this be great to see on youtube?

President Bush brought the 123rd annual spring dinner of the Gridiron Club to a rousing close Saturday by donning a tan cowboy hat above his white-tie and tails singing, onstage, a self-parody of a Texas-flavored country-and-western song.

“You have just witnessed the first and final performance of Bush and the Busharoos,” the president said, after rendering a final encore of the “Brown, Brown Grass of Home,” the venerable waltz tune, in a voice that did minimal musical justice to Tom Jones’ popular version.

In another stanza, Bush sang, “I spend my days clearing brush. I clear my head of all the fuss you made of Harriet and Brownie.” He was referring, of course, to Harriet Miers, his former counsel and abortive Supreme Court nominee, and Michael Brown, who resigned, post-Katrina, as the nation’s federal preparedness chief 10 days after Bush said, “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.”

Ending on a serious note, the president said: “Let me give you a simple truth that I believe wholeheartedly — you can’t have a true democracy without a free press.” But then he added: “I’ll admit that sometimes you do get on my nerves.”

Before leaving the stage, Bush joined hands with Helen Thomas, 87, a Hearst News papers columnist and one of his sharpest critics, for the traditional group singing of “Auld Lang Syne.” Then he planted a kiss on her cheek.

Earlier, when the curtain came down on the Democratic skit, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland stood in with two days’ notice for Rep. Charles Rangel of New York, who remained hospitalized with the flu.

“Now I know how [Ariz. Sen.] John McCain feels,” Hoyer said, “I may not even be your second choice. But if I hit a home run,” [Rep.] Henry Waxman [D-Calif.] is going to give me a hearing.”

Planted a kiss on Helen Thomas’s cheek? Ugh…..he must of gagged soon after.