Six years after the 9/11 terror attacks on the U.S., it seems the media still have some educational work to do. A new CBS/New York Times poll reveals that even today, 1 in 3 Americans believe that “Saddam Hussein was personally involved in the September 11th, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.”
This notion was thoroughly debunked by official sources, including those in the White House, years ago, but the myth endures. Polls have shown that belief in this untruth was a prime component in support for the attack on Iraq.
There is, of course, a partisan difference. Dems are the least likely to get this wrong, and Republicans are the most likely to get this wrong. How bad is it? A whopping 40% of Republicans, six years after the attacks, still believe Saddam Hussein was personally involved in 9/11. So, for every five Republicans you meet, on average, two of them are confused about this basic fact.
That’s quite a few Republicans.
I frequently struggle with who deserves the blame for this kind of ignorance. On the one hand, democracy can only thrive with an informed electorate, and people have to take some responsibility for understanding the basics of current events.
On the other hand, there’s still an ongoing effort to mislead people about reality.
The television commercial is grim and gripping: A soldier who lost both legs in an explosion near Fallujah explains why he thinks U.S. forces need to stay in Iraq.
“They attacked us,” he says as the screen turns to an image of the second hijacked airplane heading toward the smoking World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. “And they will again. They won’t stop in Iraq.”
Every investigation has shown that Iraq did not, in fact, have anything to do with the Sept. 11 attacks. But the ad, part of a new $15 million media blitz launched by an advocacy group [Freedom’s Watch] allied with the White House, may be the most overt attempt during the current debate in Congress over the war to link the attacks with Iraq.
Former Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, one of the group’s founders, said the ad is not misleading by saying “they attacked us” in the context of Iraq and showing the image of the Sept. 11 attack. “Iraqis did not attack us on 9/11,” he agreed. But it does not matter, Fleischer added, because some of the same sorts of people who did are now fighting U.S. forces in Iraq.
“Nine-one-one absolutely is a bona fide, legitimate reason to remind people what’s at stake,” he said. “The point is not that Iraq was responsible for 9/11. They’re not. But 9/11 should be a vivid reminder to everyone about how vulnerable our country is and that’s why we need to win in Iraq.”
And if people are confused into believing a lie, so be it.