And it’s the fourth hour of the “Today” show.

The fourth hour, which is hosted by Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb, averaged 1.9 million viewers this year, up 10% from 2008. (Last week, the pair averaged 2.1 million).

The fourth hour of the “Today” show (or FHOTS) launched in 2007.

We can only speculate as to why FHOTS saw such a growth in popularity this year. Maybe it was this. Another theory after the jump.

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Amanda Ernst, editor of FishbowlNY, was on the FHOTS (Fourth Hour of the “Today” show) this morning as the subject of a Jean Chatzky financial makeover. Last year, Amanda was laid off from a staff job at Condé Nast and began working fulltime freelance for us here at Mediabistro.

On FBNY, Amanda writes about her experience and includes this factoid: “After I was made pretty and mic’d up, I was all ready to be interviewed by Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford. Gifford is not shaking hands anymore because of swine flu, so she wanted to bump butts, which was hard to do while I was sitting down.”

I know what you’re thinking – if Katie Lee is bumping butts how, pray tell, does Hoda introduce herself?

Today on the mediabistro.com Morning Media Menu we’re joined by FishbowlNY editor Amanda Ernst.

We’ll take a look at the Mirror Awards earlier this week, and look ahead to what may happen in the New York Times/Boston Globe stand-off.

Also: USA Today’s economic worries and Joy Behar‘s new cable news show.

You can listen to all the past podcasts at BlogTalkRadio.com/mediabistro and call in at 646-929-0321.

Click here to receive mediabistro.com’s Daily Newsfeed via email.

FishbowlNY’s Amanda Ernst has the full recap from last night’s Gracie Awards.

CNBC host Suze Orman accepted her sixth Gracie award during the ceremony — the most ever. “I’m a woman and I’m so proud to be a woman, and I’m proud to do programming for women,” Orman said in her acceptance speech. “But we need to build each other up, not tear each other down…We all have to make sure that women rule because in my opinion they most certainly do.”

Others in the crowd: Bob Schieffer, Katie Couric, Ann Curry and Anderson Cooper. Check FBNY for more…

Today on the mediabistro.com Morning Media Menu podcast we’re joined by new FishbowlNY editor Amanda Ernst.

Did the New York Times have the Watergate scandal tip even earlier than Woodward and Bernstein put the pieces together for the Washington Post? So says a New York Times article. We’ll discuss the implications, as well as a couple other stories from the newsfeed: Twitter’s new TV show and Republicans flocking to HuffPost.

Also discussed: the breaking news of Pres. Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor.

You can listen to all the past podcasts at BlogTalkRadio.com/mediabistro and call in at 646-929-0321.

Click here to receive mediabistro.com’s Daily Newsfeed via email.