Nothing, not even a bipartisan finding by the U.S. Senate, will ever convince about 40 percent of Americans that there was no connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda — or especially that there was no connection between Hussein and 9/11. Nonetheless, it is so:

Saddam Hussein rejected overtures from al-Qaida and believed Islamic extremists were a threat to his regime, a reverse portrait of an Iraq allied with Osama bin Laden painted by the Bush White House, a Senate panel has found.

The administration’s version was based in part on intelligence that White House officials knew was flawed, according to Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee, citing newly declassified documents released by the panel.

The report, released Friday, discloses for the first time an October 2005 CIA assessment that prior to the war Saddam’s government “did not have a relationship, harbor or turn a blind eye toward” al-Qaida operative Abu Musab al-Zarqawi or his associates.

President Bush’s misadventure in Iraq has been a tragic waste of blood and treasure. Another tragedy is that so many Americans can be so easily fooled by such an obvious huckster.