43% of Americans believe that Saddam Hussein was personally involved in 9/11

Memnoch · 08-10-2006 9:52am #1

Americans never seize to amaze me.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cenk-uygur/43-of-americans-still-be_b_28877.html

Asked whether former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was personally involved in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, 52 percent said he was not, but 43 percent said they believe he was. The White House has denied Hussein's 9/11 involvement -- most recently in a news conference August 21, when President Bush said Hussein had "nothing" to do with the attacks.

Okay the guy in the video does seem to be a bit of a psycho but he's funny and makes some valid points.

Here's a link to the original CNN article...
http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/09/06/iraq.poll/index.html

Seriously though, how can a democracy function when such a huge portion of the populace is clearly ignorant and clueless? This is the power of and danger from organizations like FOX news that are responsible for spreading this kind of misinformation and propaganda.

philologos · 08-10-2006 10:00am

hahaha!! Thats insane....

constitutionus · 08-10-2006 10:56am

just be glad they havent mixed "iraq" up with "ireland". both begin with "I" and share several letters so they must be connected

edanto · 08-10-2006 11:19am

Dubya wrote:

One of the hardest parts of my job is to connect Iraq to the War on Terror

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEJY6g-Z3nE (about 6 minutes in, after the staying focussed bit)

I'd imagine that is a hard part of his job, especially considering this next clip where Bush answers the question, "What did Iraq have to do with the attack on the WTC?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9VNBmN_HUA

Another stunning stat from that Cenk blog is the Zogby survey saying that 85% of troops in Iraq believe that Hussein was responsible for 9/11. Glibly then, are US soldiers twice as gullible as regular citizens? Or is part of the selection process to look for people that won't question what they're told?

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar · 08-10-2006 11:43am

isn't that why eircom changed their name, didn't want to be getting mixed up with telecom iran in the minds of the americans

08-10-2006 11:50am

constitutionus wrote:

just be glad they havent mixed "iraq" up with "ireland". both begin with "I" and share several letters so they must be connected

http://carcino.gen.nz/images/index.php/0c898237/6af39248

bonkey · 08-10-2006 11:56am

Not to mention that Iraq is scarily similar in shape to county Monaghan.

mike65 · 08-10-2006 12:03pm

This needs putting in context.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0701-05.htm

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040216-113955-2061r.htm

http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=146

http://www.randomperspective.com/page.asp?1news/3/022

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/07/14/us_ghost_survey/

Mike.

Thomas_S_Hunterson · 08-10-2006 12:11pm

Memnoch wrote:

Seriously though, how can a democracy function when such a huge portion of the populace is clearly ignorant and clueless? This is the power of and danger from organizations like FOX news that are responsible for spreading this kind of misinformation and propaganda.

Thats the reason why it functions. The US is simply too large to function as an open democracy. There is too much money involved and too many differing opinions. To maintain any sort of stability, certain human rights have to be controlled, as such the fictional "Licence to Kill", or "Fifth Freedom" exists albeit not officially in writing. This seems to come under the guise of anti-terrorism laws, and anti-treason laws which still legalise torture. The idiot americans are willing to just jump when told to, if there is any mention of terrorism.

Akrasia · 08-10-2006 1:09pm

Americans are so indoctrinated it's really not funny.

Here is part of a conversation i had with an american 'Liberal' a few days ago. This guy is a respected Lawyer and his opinions are still insane.

why did americans vote for bush..

oyaji said:

People:

a) are stupid
b) were afraid
c) didn't like Kerry personally
e) didn't cotton to Kerry politically because he was a god-awful candidate.

Akrasia said:

or, the real reason. more than 3.6 million, mostly democratic votes were not counted.

This is a fact by the way, not a theory.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/05/15/1334249

his reply

Wah wah wah. There are electorial shenanigans in every presidential election. There are a great number of presidential elections about which we could say that the "real" outcome-determinative reason was such skulduggery (e.g. the 1960 presidential election). But that's not the "real reason."

The real reason is that Kennedy was a better candidate than Nixon and he had a more effective campaign. The real reason that Bush won again was that he was a more appealing candidate than whishy-washy Kerry and Bush's campaign was far more effective and disciplined than Kerry's and Karl Rove has the ground game dominated.

No one wants to hear this tired old saw of the stolen election in 2004. Welcome to American politics; cry me a river.

My response

did you look at my link?
There are shenanigans in most elections, but not all shenanigans are equal. What happened in 2004 was classic Election theft, Joseph Stalin style.
(Stalin said famously "It's not the people who vote that counts, it's the people who count the votes"
The scale of electoral fraud being perpetrated by the Republican party is unprecedented in American history.
3.6 million votes not counted, millions more gave up without even getting to the ballots due to deliberate under resourcing of the voting centers where the majority of the voters are democrats. The republicans had "caging lists" of thousands of black democrat voters who were to be challenged at the ballot box. Some of these lists were mistakenly e-mailed to georgebush.org. The evidence is there if you just open your eyes.
How can you defend this kind of corruption?

How can you say "Wah Wah Wah, It's all in the past, move along people, we're bored of that". It's not over, the fraud is not a one time only deal. It happened in 2000, your country "Moved on" it happened in 2004, your country complained a bit and "moved on" and it's going to happen in 2008 and that will leave plenty of time for the republicans to destroy every last shred of decency in the heart of america.

His reply

I'm not defending it. I'm saying that both parties do this ****. The solution to the problem is either to win by so much that the cheating at the margins doesn't matter or to cheat better at the margins. Bush was a terrible candidate in 2004. A decent alternative would have dominated him. Instead the dems picked a candidate destined to do poorly. We picked a candidate who had absolutely no hope of winning or at least being competitive in the south. We picked a candidate who was all over the place and totally undisciplined. The fact of the matter is that both elections were within the margin of error for the machines and processes used to count the votes. Okay, yeah, the shenanigans such. But there will always be shenanigans. Karl Rove could never "steal" an election from Clinton.

Your whinging is not accomplishing anything. If you were advocating something productive as an alternative to being victimized by republican dirty tricks, I would be all for it. But you're not. You're crying like a big ****ing baby. Take it on the chin and move on

The conversation went on like that for a few pages. I kept talking about the specifics of the republican election fraud, he kept saying that the solution was to have a better Democrat candidate and to cheat just as much as the republicans.

Dave! · 08-10-2006 1:10pm

Oh dear god..... That's scary. How are these people so f*cking stupid?!?!?! Read some of the links posted by mike65 too.

AHOKSLOG<DSFHOKMPRLMLRP<DRP{L<DLD<FB{<EG GRRRRRRGGGGGG!!!!!!!!

idiots.

Akrasia · 08-10-2006 1:22pm

I had a theory that the same proportion of americans who believe in the Saddam/9/11 link are also opponents of Evolution and proponents of young earth creationism.

I was right. a 2001 Gallup poll demonstrated that 45% of Americans believe God created Man in his present form. http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/current/creation/evol-poll.htm

Thomas_S_Hunterson · 08-10-2006 1:39pm

Akrasia wrote:

I was right. a 2001 Gallup poll demonstrated that 45% of Americans believe God created Man in his present form. http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/current/creation/evol-poll.htm

ROFL

pete · 08-10-2006 1:50pm

mike65 wrote:

This needs putting in context.
http://www.randomperspective.com/page.asp?1news/3/022

that link wrote:

For people concerned by this article, Professor Wilson had the following advice:

“Always double check your facts – just because you have seen a fact printed in one place does not make it a fact. It could be a hoax website – or even a piece of news satire.”

With the advent of the Internet, many news satire pieces are being picked up by people and being quoted as fact. A famous example of this is China's leading newspaper – the Beijing Evening Star – quoting a story from the Onion that stated Congress were demanding a new Capitol building with a retractable dome.

An even more shocking example was when the CIA inadvertently mistook a news report on a small online satire magazine run by two students that a small village in Canada was a training camp for Al-Qaeda operatives and levelled it with an air strike killing 130 innocent people.

weh weh weh

bonkey · 08-10-2006 2:10pm

An even more shocking example was when the CIA inadvertently mistook a news report on a small online satire magazine run by two students that a small village in Canada was a training camp for Al-Qaeda operatives and levelled it with an air strike killing 130 innocent people.

Thats just class, that is.

the_syco · 08-10-2006 2:10pm

Lolerz @ http://www.randomperspective.com/page.asp?1news/3/022

=-=

Not surprised with the 43% figure, tbh, esp as 51% voted for Bush. That means 51% belived his lies.

08-10-2006 2:24pm

If they're so stupid,how are they so powerfull?

Akrasia · 08-10-2006 2:34pm

Tristrame wrote:

If they're so stupid,how are they so powerfull?

The people are indoctrinated, the rulers are powerful because they have the biggest guns and no qualms about using them.
Power is not necessarily derrived from intelligence, more often, power comes from violence and aggression

philologos · 08-10-2006 2:40pm

Clever people within US Politics are able to manipulate much of the US public. That's how their system works. They fail to recognise that they have made Iraq worse since they have invaded it. Torture is now worse than it was under Saddam. It was bad then but its even worse now.

08-10-2006 3:01pm

So there are some clever people in the U.S but most of them are stupid and hence they are the most powerfull country in the world.

I see.

RedPlanet · 08-10-2006 3:12pm

Tristrame wrote:

If they're so stupid,how are they so powerfull?

Bullies usually aren't the brighest.
Maybe Americans opt for military power because they have small d***s?

mike65 · 08-10-2006 3:24pm

They are powerful cos you don't need to be Mastermind to work hard and apply oneself to doing a good job in everyday life. Sure its easy to mock they lack of nous of many Joe Citizens but Yanks will never slack and thats where the money to buy the guns comes from.

Mike.

08-10-2006 3:50pm

People are equally stupid here, it's just there hasn't been quite so much effort put into manipulating the population.

Best not to underestimate the intelligence of the people pulling the strings.

spooiirt!! · 08-10-2006 5:35pm

Yeah yeah americans are dumb. Say how many of the worlds top twenty universities are American? How many are Irish?

Time Magazine · 08-10-2006 6:31pm

spooiirt!! wrote:

Yeah yeah americans are dumb. Say how many of the worlds top twenty universities are American? How many are Irish?

Ireland has a population of 4 million people, the USA have something in the region of 290 million.

We have seven universities; less than the USA have in the world's top twenty.

These cows are small, but those are far away.

spooiirt!! · 08-10-2006 7:56pm

Ah so its the Population game you wanna play?

USA, 280 million, 17 of the top 20 Unis.
France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Holland, England, Switzerland,Ireland, Austria, approx 280 million, 2 of the top twenty unis.

These kiss my ass are small, but those are far away.

Akrasia · 08-10-2006 8:45pm

spooiirt!! wrote:

Ah so its the Population game you wanna play?

USA, 280 million, 17 of the top 20 Unis.
France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Holland, England, Switzerland,Ireland, Austria, approx 280 million, 2 of the top twenty unis.

These kiss my ass are small, but those are far away.

The top american universities have far more resources at their disposal compared with universities in Ireland or in most of Europe. American universities can afford to buy in talent from around the world. They can attract the brightest students and the best academic staff.

For an irish student to attend Trinity College, Arguably Ireland's best Universtiy, it is free, (or you can say about 1,000 if you include student services fees) for an american student to attend Harvard it costs around $40,000 per year.

Memnoch · 08-10-2006 8:54pm

spooiirt!! wrote:

Yeah yeah americans are dumb. Say how many of the worlds top twenty universities are American? How many are Irish?

not all americans, just 43% of them, which is still over a 100 million people.

Probably, none of those 43% went to or will go to any of those top twenty universities your talking about.

Unless off course the University of Holy Bible Truths is among them.

LostinBlanch · 08-10-2006 8:59pm

constitutionus wrote:

just be glad they havent mixed "iraq" up with "ireland". both begin with "I" and share several letters so they must be connected

And we sit right beside them in the UN :eek: With Israel on the other side

spooiirt!! · 08-10-2006 9:35pm

Memnoch wrote:

Unless off course the University of Holy Bible Truths is among them.

Yeah or the university of typical stereotypes. Biddel di die diedell die hey, wheres your pot of gold my son?

"For an irish student to attend Trinity College, Arguably Ireland's best Universtiy, it is free, (or you can say about 1,000 if you include student services fees) for an american student to attend Harvard it costs around $40,000 per year"

Yes of course it costs more for the student. How much does it cost the state to send one student to trinners?

"American universities can afford to buy in talent from around the world. They can attract the brightest students and the best academic staff."

Of course. Money. Thats what makes them better. And? Does that take away from the fact that they are better?

(it also depends on wether you get a scholarship or not. American Colleges give Scholarships for just about everything. A mate of mine is on a partial football scholarship in Wisconsin. He only pays half price, and hes only a back up player. )
If someone is really bright in the US theyll go to harvard, princeton etc wether they can afford it or not. I remember reading that american colleges give 25000 scholarships to foreign students alone every year.

Akrasia · 09-10-2006 1:23am

spooiirt!! wrote:

Yeah or the university of typical stereotypes. Biddel di die diedell die hey, wheres your pot of gold my son?

"For an irish student to attend Trinity College, Arguably Ireland's best Universtiy, it is free, (or you can say about 1,000 if you include student services fees) for an american student to attend Harvard it costs around $40,000 per year"

Yes of course it costs more for the student. How much does it cost the state to send one student to trinners?

I think the state subvention is around €8,000 per student. (less for arts, slightly more for engineering students)
That is less than 1/4 of the per student funding in U.S. colleges, and that doesn't include the massive corporate funding given to Ivy league U.S. universities and the huge State funding given to research at these universities that dwarfs funding given to Irish or european universities.

"American universities can afford to buy in talent from around the world. They can attract the brightest students and the best academic staff."

Of course. Money. Thats what makes them better. And? Does that take away from the fact that they are better?

Money makes those universities better. Nobody is arguing against the facts that the Top U.S. universities are better institutions than Irish or European counterparts. I am arguing that the fact that the U.S. has the worlds best universities is a good indication of the level of intelligence of the average U.S. citizen. Clearly it is not.

(it also depends on wether you get a scholarship or not. American Colleges give Scholarships for just about everything. A mate of mine is on a partial football scholarship in Wisconsin. He only pays half price, and hes only a back up player. )
If someone is really bright in the US theyll go to harvard, princeton etc wether they can afford it or not. I remember reading that american colleges give 25000 scholarships to foreign students alone every year.

The fact that U.S. colleges give high scholarships for athletes is no secret. It is also nothing to do with the level of intelligence of the American people. College sports in America is massive business. The investment by the universities in Scholarships for talented athletes would more than pay for itself through increased income from successful sporting teams. (another revenue stream not available to Irish or european universities)

43% of Americans believe that Saddam Hussein was personally involved in 9/11

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