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Wow. I live in one of the most conservative states in the country, and I've never heard anyone suggest that Saddam Hussein had anything to do with 9/11. If anyo

by phaus 14y ago

Wow. I live in one of the most conservative states in the country, and I've never heard anyone suggest that Saddam Hussein had anything to do with 9/11. If anyone did, I'm sure they would be immediately called out and ridiculed by pretty much everyone. That's not really what the controversy in Iraq was about, but I don't want to derail. A better example might be the hysterical fear of nuclear power that our country developed after Chernobyl.

webXL 14y ago
Same here. Just because the Bush administration spent a few hours tracking down leads in Iraq in the aftermath of 9/11 doesn't mean there's more "Saddam did 9/11" belief than "Elvis is alive" belief. Yes, in retrospect it was a stupid war and put a nail in the coffin of my belief that military action was the one thing our government had a hold on, but stop spouting the straw-man lie that Iraq was payback for 9/11.
- Fishkins 14y ago
  For quite a while a majority of the US did believe Saddam was directly involved in 9/11 [0]. Although it's a minority opinion now, it's still a quite sizeable minority. Anecdotally, I remember hearing such claims/speculation in the news frequently just after 9/11, before they moved on to other excuses. [0] http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html
  - phaus 14y ago
    What's the sample size for that survey? Howard Stern sent someone wandering through the streets of one of the poorest parts of New York, and found a bunch of idiots who either didn't know who the president was, or thought that Mitt Romney would win the election solely because he is an African American. That doesn't mean that everyone in New York is stupid. Any survey that supposes to represent a national opinion should involve at the very least, several million people. I'm just a bit taken aback, because that's such a ridiculous and idiotic view to hold. It's almost as stupid as believing the holocaust didn't happen.
rdw 14y ago
Personal experience doesn't really help with understanding something like this, so the fact that no one you know has said anything in support of this idea doesn't mean that it's not widely believed. At the time of the war, as many as 70% (!) of Americans believed that Saddam was responsible for 9/11, and since then the number has slowly declined to the mid-20s (with a weird period where the number increased around 2007). For a falsehood that, as you say, is ridiculously unsupported. http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-09-06-poll-iraq_x.htm http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-09-06-po... http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Poll_41_of_Americans_believe_Saddam_0624.html http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Poll_41_of_Americans_believe_S... http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html http://themoderatevoice.com/121921/ten-years-later-belief-in-iraq-connection-with-911-attack-persists/ http://themoderatevoice.com/121921/ten-years-later-belief-in... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein_and_al-Qaeda_link_allegations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein_and_al-Qaeda_lin... The ridiculousness degree to which the American public grasped onto this false belief eventually led to the meme that 20% of Americans will believe any old thing. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/24/one-in-five-americans-believe_n_691843.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/24/one-in-five-america... And of course: http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-1-in-5-americans-believe-obama-is-a-cactus,18127/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-1-in-5-americans-belie...
- phaus 14y ago
  I think that I'm just in denial about how stupid people can be. It just boggles my mind. Al Qaeda almost immediately took credit, the government almost immediately verified that it was Osama Bin Laden, and there are lots of other reasons why it's pretty unlikely. I could understand if average Americans thought that Saddam might have some minor relationship with Al Qaeda, but even that's a stretch. Saddam was barely a Muslim, let alone an extremist. As long as you didn't live in Fallujah, Iraq used to be one of the more religiously tolerant countries. The only reason the Iraqi flag had "Allahu Akbar" on it is because he wanted to gain the sympathy from his neighbors during the Gulf War. I guess I'm just disappointed.
  - rdw 14y ago

by phaus 14y ago

webXL 14y ago

Same here. Just because the Bush administration spent a few hours tracking down leads in Iraq in the aftermath of 9/11 doesn't mean there's more "Saddam did 9/11" belief than "Elvis is alive" belief. Yes, in retrospect it was a stupid war and put a nail in the coffin of my belief that military action was the one thing our government had a hold on, but stop spouting the straw-man lie that Iraq was payback for 9/11.

Fishkins 14y ago
For quite a while a majority of the US did believe Saddam was directly involved in 9/11 [0]. Although it's a minority opinion now, it's still a quite sizeable minority. Anecdotally, I remember hearing such claims/speculation in the news frequently just after 9/11, before they moved on to other excuses. [0] http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html
- phaus 14y ago
  What's the sample size for that survey? Howard Stern sent someone wandering through the streets of one of the poorest parts of New York, and found a bunch of idiots who either didn't know who the president was, or thought that Mitt Romney would win the election solely because he is an African American. That doesn't mean that everyone in New York is stupid. Any survey that supposes to represent a national opinion should involve at the very least, several million people. I'm just a bit taken aback, because that's such a ridiculous and idiotic view to hold. It's almost as stupid as believing the holocaust didn't happen.

rdw 14y ago

Personal experience doesn't really help with understanding something like this, so the fact that no one you know has said anything in support of this idea doesn't mean that it's not widely believed. At the time of the war, as many as 70% (!) of Americans believed that Saddam was responsible for 9/11, and since then the number has slowly declined to the mid-20s (with a weird period where the number increased around 2007). For a falsehood that, as you say, is ridiculously unsupported. http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-09-06-poll-iraq_x.htm http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-09-06-po... http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Poll_41_of_Americans_believe_Saddam_0624.html http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Poll_41_of_Americans_believe_S... http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-501863_162-3253552.html http://themoderatevoice.com/121921/ten-years-later-belief-in-iraq-connection-with-911-attack-persists/ http://themoderatevoice.com/121921/ten-years-later-belief-in... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein_and_al-Qaeda_link_allegations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein_and_al-Qaeda_lin... The ridiculousness degree to which the American public grasped onto this false belief eventually led to the meme that 20% of Americans will believe any old thing. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/24/one-in-five-americans-believe_n_691843.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/24/one-in-five-america... And of course: http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-1-in-5-americans-believe-obama-is-a-cactus,18127/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/poll-1-in-5-americans-belie...

phaus 14y ago
I think that I'm just in denial about how stupid people can be. It just boggles my mind. Al Qaeda almost immediately took credit, the government almost immediately verified that it was Osama Bin Laden, and there are lots of other reasons why it's pretty unlikely. I could understand if average Americans thought that Saddam might have some minor relationship with Al Qaeda, but even that's a stretch. Saddam was barely a Muslim, let alone an extremist. As long as you didn't live in Fallujah, Iraq used to be one of the more religiously tolerant countries. The only reason the Iraqi flag had "Allahu Akbar" on it is because he wanted to gain the sympathy from his neighbors during the Gulf War. I guess I'm just disappointed.
- rdw 14y ago