They know what they want to know

Sixty-five percent of Republicans still believe there's a connection between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

Published September 6, 2006 12:42PM (EDT)

From the "God Help Us All" Department, John Zogby delivers this dreary bit of polling news: Even though George W. Bush has finally acknowledged that Iraq had "nothing" to do with 9/11, 46 percent of Americans still believe that there was "a connection" between Saddam Hussein and the attacks.

It gets worse. Only 50 percent say there was no connection, meaning you can add 4 percent who don't know one way or another to the 46 percent who "know" something that's pretty much undisputedly false. Among Republicans, the numbers are even more depressing: Sixty-five percent of them say there was a connection between Saddam and 9/11. "Only" 32 percent of Democrats and 39 percent of independents share that view.

The good news? In a Washington Post poll taken in September 2003, 69 percent of Americans said that Saddam Hussein was involved in planning 9/11. Three years and about 2,400 dead soldiers later, it seems that at least some of our children is learning.


By Tim Grieve

Tim Grieve is a senior writer and the author of Salon's War Room blog.

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