Americans back Bush, not agencies, on Sept. 11 actions

A plurality of Americans think President Bush did all that he could have possibly done with his early warnings of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, a Newsweek poll suggests.

Forty-eight percent of adults surveyed last week said the president did all that he should have with the information; 39 percent said he didn't do enough. But other federal officials didn't fare as well in the poll: Fifty-three percent apiece said that FBI and CIA officials didn't do enough, while 46 percent said the same of the president's national security advisers.

Fifty-five percent said that, given the administration's knowledge of potential threats, public warnings of possible airline hijackings should have been issued. The warnings, though, probably wouldn't have changed the events of Sept. 11, 67 percent said.