The concerns the US had relating to Iraq post 9/11 had and never have had anything to do directly with the Al-Qaeda attacks of September 11th 2001. That being so there was absolutely nothing whatsoever to be gained from them having people believe that Iraq had something to do with 911 when patently they did not.

So of the three points made above by Little Hawk

1. "The Bush administration was delighted that a lot of people in the USA would be dumb enough or ill informed enough to think that Saddam had something to do with 911, so they implied it in various ways, but..."

Pointless it is of no advantage whatsoever. A number of very senior members of the Bush Administration put themselves on record very early on stating that Iraq and Saddam Hussein had absolutely nothing to do with 911 - the so-called implications were all spin by the MSM in the US, Olbermann included.

2. "They were not stupid enough to directly say it in a literal and undeniable statement, they just helped create a convenient sort of general rhetorical climate so that a lot of ill-informed people would imagine that it was the case, and..."

Now the first part of this is true, because they had stated from the outset that Iraq and Saddam had nothing to do with 911, and having said that they could hardly back-track and imply anything different, which makes the second part of the above nonsense.

3. "Olberman, for his part, was eager to attack and damage Bush and Cheney in any way he possibly could and was probably willing to be quite unscrupulous and manipulative in doing so, just as Bush and Cheney were willing to be quite unscrupulous and manipulative in doing and saying things that would get the public onside for an invasion of Iraq."

Again first part of this is "dead-on-the-money". The second part is nonsense for the following reasons:

- In order to protect the United States of America from any perceived threat the President of the United States does not have to get "the public onside". The public are never consulted in such cases, both houses of Congress on the other hand are, so what the public thought didn't matter a damn.

- It was the Intelligence and Security Services and Agencies of the United States Government that specifically identified Iraq as posing a threat to the United States of America in 1998

- Post 911 it was all 19 of the USA's intelligence services and the Joint House Security Committee that independently assessed and evaluated Iraq as being the country that represented the greatest threat to the United States of America - Not the Bush Administration. Therefore as the only people the Administration had to "get onside" were the Senate and the House of Representatives it would appear that they were already there ahead of them - so they didn't have to fed any implied references or have any climates created for them, they had already presented their findings to the President and were waiting for him to act - The President did, he went to the UN.