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On World News tonight, Osama bin Laden shows up on a videotape four days before the election.
He tries to explain why Al-Qaeda attacked on 9-11 and why he would do it again.
The final weekend of the presidential campaign, Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry try to hone that final message and respond to bin Laden too.
Today's report about the economy, there's something for both candidates to work with,
and our person of the week, so important to the cause with so little recognition.
From ABC News World Headquarters in New York, this is World News Tonight with Peter Jennings.
Good evening everyone. We do begin tonight with Osama bin Laden.
He showed up again just a few hours ago on videotape, the first time we've seen him talking since November 2001.
Only two months after the attacks on 9-11. We've heard him since and we've seen him since then,
but today with the presidential election only four days away, bin Laden has imposed himself on Americans once again.
This time in a message to the American people, as he put it, bin Laden seems to explain himself
and when he first thought of attacking the trade towers.
Bin Laden spoke in Arabic. If I hate freedom, he said, as Bush says, why wouldn't I attack Sweden, which is a freer country?
Bin Laden looks fine, which is to say he doesn't look ill. His hands were steady, his beard no grayer than we have seen it in the past.
Every intelligence agency in the world is now looking at the tape, and both the president and Mr. Kerry must now deal with a genuine October surprise.
First on the tape, here's ABC's Brian Ross.
Sitting behind a desk like a head of state, the 47-year-old bin Laden calmly read his message to America.
The security of the Americans are in their hands, he said, and any state which does not mess with our security will be automatically secured.
For the first time, bin Laden took direct responsibility for the September 11 attacks.
We decided to destroy towers in America, he said, after our patience ran out and we saw the injustice
and inflexibility of the American-Israeli alliance toward our people.
Bin Laden said the destruction of building towers in Beirut during the Israeli invasion in 1982 inspired him to target the towers of New York.
And he said the best way to avoid another Manhattan was to stop threatening Muslim security.
The last time video of bin Laden was released was in September of last year,
footage of him walking with his deputy that intelligence officials believe was actually made in 2001.
It is not known when today's tape was recorded, but it contains several references to next week's election,
even a mention of what he called the forgeries in Florida in the last election.
The security of Americans, he said, is not in the hands, he said.
U.S. officials are now debating whether anything on the tape gives reason to raise the national threat level.
But whatever the case, after three years on the run, Peter, Mr. Bin Laden is still in a position to wage at least a war of words against this country from wherever he's hiding.
Speaking of words, one of our colleagues in the Middle East and I said he was a little surprised in that this was not the rant that we had come to expect from al-Qaeda tapes.
It had a slightly almost offensive quality to it.
Very much so, very calm and collected, but trying to explain himself in a way that we've not seen quite before.
And very much identifying the president and Mr. Bush Sr., the former president, with those leaders in the Middle East who hand on power to their sons.
He lumps them all together as corrupt and greedy.
Many thanks, Brian. Brian Ross.
The text of all this, by the way, you can find at ABCNews.com.
Of course, it's quite fascinating and disgusting to read.
Both of the presidential candidates, of course, had something to say about the Bin Laden tape this afternoon.
First, here's the president.
Let me make this very clear.
Americans will not be intimidated or influenced by an enemy of our country.
I'm sure Senator Kerry agrees with this.
I also want to say to the American people that we're at war with these terrorists.
And I am confident that we will prevail.
Let me just make it clear, crystal clear.
As Americans, we are absolutely united in our determination to hunt down and destroy Osama Bin Laden and the terrorists.
They are barbarians.
And I will stop at absolutely nothing to hunt down, capture or kill the terrorists wherever they are, whatever it takes. Period.
So this is, of course, now a factor to some degree in the presidential election for the last few days.
ABC's George Stephanopoulos is with us.
It's probably not appropriate of me to characterize the tape as I did calling it disgusting.
How does a politician identify with the disgust of most, if not all Americans and still either use this for his presidential campaign or see that it doesn't hurt him?
Very carefully.
Look at the word that Senator Kerry used, barbarians.
Most important for both Senator Kerry and President Bush here is to look sober, to look tough and to look patriotic, not partisan.
It will get, in fact, as we've seen on the television already in the debate, it's got pretty partisan already.
No question about it. Senator Kerry's surrogates aren't saying what Senator Kerry has said before.
They're reminding people that President Bush had his chance at Tora Bora, they say, to get Osama Bin Laden and he didn't do it.
But it's unclear at this point.
And then a Bush surrogate came back and said that was exploitation.
No, and you're going to hear that over the weekend.
But it's unclear, I think, to me how these politics are going to play out.
You can say it helps President Bush because he leads on the war on terror.
It helps Senator Kerry because President Bush didn't capture Osama Bin Laden.
My guess is it's a wash.
Most people have already made up their mind in this election.
Many thanks, George. George Stephanopoulos.
Our latest tracking poll, by the way, shows a statistical dead heat in the race overall.
Still, 50-47 for the president, now a slight improvement for Mr. Bush compared to yesterday.
Senator Kerry barnstormed across the pivotal state of Florida today.
And there was a clear shift in emphasis before this because he has begun to deliver what you could say is his closing argument to the voters.
ABC's Dean Reynolds has covered the campaign for weeks.
After all the months and miles, the handshakes, speeches and polls, the time has come for John Kerry's final appeal to the nation.
When you go into that voting booth, you're going to face a fundamental choice.
Do you want four more years at the same failed course or do you want a fresh start?
Kerry! Kerry! Kerry!
In Orlando this morning, the candidate summarized what he sees as his opponents' failings.
And they go way beyond the war in Iraq.
Biggest deficits in history, jobs overseas, costs going up, wages falling for Americans.
This is George Bush's record. But it doesn't have to be our future.
When Kerry spoke in Orlando and later in Miami, he was unaware of Osama Bin Laden's latest taped message.
Though its release dovetailed with one of his central points, that any American who reads newspapers or watches TV
can see that Bush's policies abroad and here at home have failed.
We need a president who can do more than one thing at the same time.
Yet polls show the race is tightening. With some movement away from Kerry and toward a president, he's called stubborn, arrogant and incompetent.
No wonder there was a hint of frustration in Kerry's voice today.
This election is a choice. Between four more years of tax giveaways for millionaires along with a higher tax burden for the middle class.
Wake up, America. Wake up.
From here on out, it's a sprint to the finish line with a concentration on Florida and the Midwest.
But as John Kerry learned today, there will always be some things that are beyond his control.
Dean Reynolds, ABC News with the Kerry campaign in Miami.
And now to the president's campaign. If Californians couldn't find their governor today, well, he was out for the president.
Here's ABC's Terry Moran.
Please welcome the governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Star power in Columbus, Ohio. After weeks of waiting for the governor, the Bush campaign finally had Arnold Schwarzenegger where they wanted him on stage with the president.
If you flex your muscles November 2nd, I guarantee you President Bush will be back.
The president used this appearance to drive home the main point he makes everywhere in these final days that this election is about war.
The terrorists who killed thousands of innocent people are still dangerous and determined to strike.
The outcome of this election will set the direction of the war against terror.
The most solemn duty of the American president is to protect the American people.
Picking up on Senator Kerry's charge tonight that Mr. Bush let Osama bin Laden slip away in the mountains of Tora Bora, the president ripped into his opponent.
Unfortunately, my opponent tonight continued to say things he knows are not true, accusing our military of passing up a chance to get Osama bin Laden in Tora Bora.
As the commander in charge of that operation, Tommy Frank has said, it's simply not the case.
It's the worst kind of Monday morning quarterbacking.
It is especially shameful in the light of a new tape from America's enemy.
Bush aid seems surprised that Kerry had decided to attack the president on the subject of bin Laden, but they say they're not worried.
As one aide put it, any conversation on the war on terrorism is a good conversation for us.
Terry Moran, ABC News, with the president in Columbus, Ohio.
What item about a story we've been following all week long and has been part of the campaign.
The Pentagon held a news conference today in another effort to clarify, maybe the word, what happened to those explosives that disappeared from an ammunition depot in Iraq.
An army major said today that his unit removed 250 tons of ammunition from the Al Qaqa site on April the 13th last year.
But when it was all said and done, he couldn't say for certain that it was the material in question.
When we come back this evening, the latest government report on the economy.
Are Americans better off than they were four years ago?
Why both presidential candidates wanted to appear on this Spanish television show this weekend.
And at the end of the broadcast on this Friday, our person of the week, anticipating every move.
For the nagging joint pain and stiffness of osteoarthritis, over-the-counter pills may not always be what you need.
But some prescriptions may not be right for you.
That's why they're Celebrex for joint pain relief.
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Celebrex targets the source of pain and inflammation.
It doesn't make you foggy.
And it's not narcotic.
Your pain doesn't slow you down.
And neither should your pain reliever.
Celebrex should not be taken if you've had aspirin-sensitive asthma or allergic reaction due to aspirin or other arthritis medicines or certain drugs called sulfonamides.
In rare cases, serious stomach problems such as bleeding can occur without warning.
Tell your doctor if you have kidney or liver problems.
Just one Celebrex gives 24-hour, all-day, all-night relief.
Talk to your doctor about prescription Celebrex.
Celebrex, joint pain relief, no more, no less.
My credit card company asked if I just bought an engagement ring in Rio de Janeiro.
Someone out there was claiming to be me.
Identity thieves have lots of tricks.
Your credit card company knows most of them.
I'm happy to say that engagement got postponed.
We head off thousands of fraudulent card uses every month, even outside the U.S.
Rio?
Your credit card company.
Whoa.
Honey, honey.
What do you think it means?
Means we're going to big lots.
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The government said today that the economy grew at an annual rate of 3.7% in the third quarter.
That was an improvement from the spring, but less than forecast.
This, of course, is the government's last snapshot of the economy before Election Day.
And our business correspondent, Betsy Stark, is with us to say that I guess each campaign gets a little bit out of it.
Each campaign does get a little bit out of it, but what matters to voters, Peter,
gets back to that question that Ronald Reagan first asked when he ran for president.
Are you better off than you were four years ago?
For most Americans, economic well-being begins with having a job.
Well, I'm not working nearly as much.
And there are 821,000 fewer jobs today than when Mr. Bush took office.
On the flip side, more Americans than ever own their own homes,
and the value of those homes has gone up an average of 26% at the same time that mortgage rates have gone down.
Even so, Americans are more in debt than they were four years ago.
They're spending 49% more for family health insurance,
35% more on tuition at public universities, and 39% more for a gallon of gas.
We spend a lot more money on gasoline now than we did four years ago.
Some Americans may have saved money from the decline in federal income taxes under Mr. Bush, on average down 10%.
Investors, however, may think about the 5% decline in the Dow during his term and the 28% drop in the Nasdaq.
Americans have lost ground on several pocketbook issues,
but when we asked in a recent poll, are you better off than you were four years ago, the results were a draw.