The White House is giving George W. Bush intelligence briefings. You know, some of these jokes just write themselves.

Letterman’s line is a late-night punchline built on irony: “intelligence briefings” are meant to inform and sharpen judgment, but the joke implies that George W. Bush lacks “intelligence” in the colloquial sense. By saying the White House is “giving” him briefings, the setup suggests a remedial effort, and the tag—“some of these jokes just write themselves”—frames the political situation as so inherently absurd (or so ripe for satire) that the comedian barely needs to invent material. The quip reflects a broader strain of early-2000s political comedy that treated Bush’s verbal slips and perceived incuriosity as emblematic, using wordplay to critique competence and leadership.