Dubya Dishes With Dave

George W. Bush may have gotten more than he bargained for during a taping of CBS' Late Show Thursday afternoon in New York City.

The guest chair where movie stars recite scripted laugh lines became a hot seat for the Texas governor, who was in the Big Apple for a Catholic political event and a few television tapings, including one for Saturday Night Live.

But it was a more amiable visit than Bush's last appearance with Letterman in March, when the governor bombed with a series of jokes about the host's heart problems.

This time Letterman focused mainly on issues, browbeating Bush for five minutes about bad air quality in Texas, and for almost four minutes on the death penalty.

Top Ten Changes I'll Make in the White House (as read by George W. Bush) From the home office in Crawford, Texas... 10. To save taxpayers dollars, calls to winning sports teams will be collect. 9. New rules in cabinet meetings: You can't talk till you ride the mechanical bull. 8. Goodbye, boring presidential radio address. Hello, "Dick Cheney spins the hits of the 80s, 90s and today." 7. Make sure White House library has lots of books with big print and pictures. 6. Just for fun, issue executive order commanding my brother Jeb to wash my car. 5. First day in office, my mother's face goes up on Mount Rushmore. 4. Look into hiring a security guard for our nuclear secrets. 3. Won't get sick on Japanese leaders like other President Bush I know. 2. Give Oval Office one heck of a scrubbing. 1. Tax relief for all Americans, except smart aleck talk-show hosts.

He also asked Bush booby-trapped essay questions about foreign affairs.

How can people in Bosnia and Rwanda be "capable of such evil," Dave wondered. Bush's answer: "There is hate. There is hate in the world."

On the Middle East, Bush said if he becomes president, terrorist strikes at the United States will cost the perpetrators a "serious price."

"What does that mean?" Letterman asked.

"That means they're not going to like what happened to them," Bush said to applause from the studio audience.

Bush made a face that said, "I don't want to play," when Letterman told him the Late Show makes a lot of jokes about the frequency of executions in the Lone Star State.

The governor repeated what he says all the time on the stump; that everyone put to death in Texas on his watch was "guilty of the crime charged" and had "full access" to all state and federal courts.

But the country's leading practitioner of the death penalty also said, "If I could be convinced it didn't deter crime, I may change my opinion about the death penalty." (Memo to Bush: Repeat this line for the Catholics at Thurday's Al Smith dinner in New York).

The famously affable Texan, whose public taste in humor skews toward clean puns and knee-slappers, didn't seem to get Letterman's brand of irony.

When the host suggested that riding an Urban Cowboy-style mechanical bull might be another kind of capital punishment, Bush had a good laugh, having admonished Dave earlier in the show that the death penalty is "serious business."

He also laughed, shoulders shaking, when Letterman said he felt Bush's infamous "ass----" slip-up was the only "honest moment" of the campaign. Then Bush did his own impression of running mate Dick Cheney's oft-quoted response: "Big time."

Bush said he was satisfied with the three presidential debates and admitted he had a low bar to clear. "A lot of folks don't think I can string a sentence together, so when I was able to do so, it uh … Expectations were so low, all I had to do was say, 'Hi, I'm George W. Bush.'"