Your denial is showing when you distort what we say, spinning the charge against Bush into the passive one of "allowing people to believe" in the false connection between Saddam and 9/11. That's not what anybody's saying, that's merely the straw man you wish you faced. The false belief in a Saddam-9/11 connection didn't coalesce out of a vacuum. I've documented the pattern of deliberate implication that created that false impression, and you yourself have provided links to articles that describe the same phenomenon independently of my observations.

Well, aside from the fact that the "implication" charge has now replaced a number of failed attempts to prove actual deception, even that doesn't stand up. You apparently missed my point in this post.

Let me reproduce the lines at the end of this page, tracking results from earlier polls:

---------------Likely------------------------------------------Not Likely------
................NET.....Very.....Somewhat........NET.....Not very.....At all......No opin.
8/11/03......69.........32..........37...............28..........15...........12 ...........3
2/6/03*......72.........34..........38...............25..........16............9.............3
10/24/02....71.........34..........37...............25..........16............9.............4
9/13/01#....78..........34.........44................12...........9.............3............9

* 2/6/03 and previous - Time/CNN. "…personally involved in the terrorist attacks
(on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon) on September 11th (2001) -- very likely,
somewhat likely…"
# "How likely is it that Saddam Hussein is personally involved in Tuesday's terrorist
attacks..."

Note that the number of those suspecting Saddam's implication was as high as 78 percent two days after the hit, and long before they could have been influenced by months of "implications."

In other words, like the poll experts said, the opinion DID "coalesce out of a vacuum."

Another rhetorical red herring is the demand that those who criticize Bush come up with better solutions. Here's a news flash for you: We don't have to. Not coming up with better answers doesn't invalidate the criticism, nor does it make Bush's actions correct. And when it comes to Iraq, Bush has cleverly painted us into a corner, rendering moot any discussion of alternatives. We're stuck with his mess, and while we can hope to make the best of Bush's bad situation, it is quite legitimate to be displeased to be in this bad situation. Bush screwed up and he can't evade being held accountable for it. That he used deception to maneuver us into this mess removes any defense that it was an innocent mistake.

We'll leave aside the presumption of "quagmire," which has yet to be proven in fact.

If someone is "butt-ugly, has poor fashion sense, is a klutz on the links, can't cook, drives too fast, and has halitosis" then it must be that you have a better idea of what is good looking, proper fashion, good golfing technique, tasty food, a proper speed limit, and at least some idea of what breath should smell like.

Not coming up with better answers doesn't invalidate the criticism, but it sure is irritating to those being criticized, and tends to show, like I said, that the motivation of the criticizer isn't the improvement of the situation.

Sorry, but it is significant that nobody, at any point in the entire Iraq war process, came up with any more plausible way of dealing with Saddam, other than just leaving him alone and hoping for the best, or throwing the wet baby to the U.N., which is pretty much the same thing. Lord knows I beat this to death with Davin and others. Those brave enough to approach the question at all generally dribbled to a halt with Hans Blix spending the next five years trudging around Iraq while hundreds of thousands of American troops cooled their heels in Qatar or on ships parked in the Gulf, the Iraqi poor continued to suffer under sanctions, and Saddam waited--once again--for everyone to go away and leave him and his dynasty to his plans.

What would "President Gore" have done differently? How come nobody ever asks him this question? Had Bush done everything you think he should have done, where would we be today? What SHOULD Bush have done? What would Saddam be doing? What would al-Qaeda be doing? These questions need to be at least considered if you're going to make a positive contribution to the conversation.