Some thought bin Laden, whose group was blamed for the September 11, 2001 attacks, was trying to tip Tuesday's election toward Democrat John Kerry; others said he was angling for four more years for President George W. Bush.

Some said his message, broadcast Friday by Al-Jazeera television, would remind voters of Bush's failure to capture him. Others said it would scare up more votes for the incumbent.

Many theorised that the tape could influence voters, but said that their own convictions remained unshaken.

The bin Laden message was just one more item in a flood of campaign news and advertising in the countdown to the campaign, according to David Hill, a musician of Denver, Colorado.

"I don't think people are really responding anymore," he said. "We're shell-shocked."

"People I know are so polarised, it doesn't make any difference," said his wife, Jan Hill.

"Wow, it's perfect timing for him to come out of the woodwork," said warehouse worker McKinley Olds of Cleveland, Ohio. "It doesn't make any difference to me, I'm still voting for Kerry."

"It's more of the same, basically, about what you'd expect from this group," said Rex Reeve of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. "I'll definitely be voting for Bush."

Tyler Lisenbee, a property manager in Denver who was leaning toward Kerry, said bin Laden was unlikely to affect the election at all unless he was captured before Tuesday.

"Then I'd probably vote for Bush," he said.

Seeing how voters appeared to have shrugoed off bin Laden's latest salvo, the article's author went on to assert that the terror kingpin may have made himself "irrelevant."