The North Korean regime is famed for many things, but a sense of humour is not generally listed among them. However, it seems that even they joke about the unpopularity of George Bush.
This unexpected development came amid the deadly serious setting of military talks between North and South Korea, whose heavily armed soldiers still belligerently face each other across the shared border.
Opening the talks today, Lieutenant General Kim Yong Chol recounted to his South Korean counterpart how he had read the joke on a US website - a telling sign in itself, given that internet use is extremely restricted in the north.
As the tale goes, a distracted president ventures out jogging one morning and is saved by a group of schoolchildren who pull him out of the path of an oncoming car. Eternally grateful, Mr Bush offers them anything they want as a reward.
"We want a place reserved for us at Arlington National Cemetery," the children say. "Why is that?" he asks. "Because our parents will kill us if they find out what we've done."
Boom boom. Well, it's not going to see Gen Kim booked in for a season at the Comedy Store, but it could be worse.
Perhaps more than anything, it reminds us that - as the man himself showed only yesterday - President Bush's unintentional comedic value crosses virtually every national and ideological boundary.
