The ABC network has aired an newly edited version of its controversial mini-series about events leading up to the September 11th attacks.
ABC toned down parts of The Path to 9/11that drew criticism from leading Democrats who called the film propaganda.
As originally presented in copies of the movie circulated to TV critics for review, The Path to 9/11strongly suggested that President Bill Clinton was too distracted by the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal to deal with the gathering threat posed by Islamic extremists in the 1990s.
But in the version of the mini-series aired by ABC on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the September 11th attacks, several specific references to the Lewinsky affair were removed.
A scene that depicted Mr Clinton's national security adviser, Samuel "Sandy" Berger, as passing on an opportunity to snatch Osama bin Laden from his hideout in Afghanistan was shortened to leave unclear who it was precisely that refused to authorise the CIA mission.
Mr Berger and others have insisted that no such episode ever occurred, and the executive producer of the miniseries, Marc Platt, acknowledged last week that the Berger scene was based on a "conflation of events".
Before the broadcast, several former Clinton aides and congressional Democrats sent letters of protest to the president of ABC's corporate parent, the Walt Disney company, complaining that the film was filled with inaccuracies and distortions.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean condemned the production as a piece of conservative political propaganda designed to tar Mr Clinton and urged ABC to cancel it.
Mr Reid suggested the film, which ABC had touted as a work based largely on the findings of the official 9/11 commission report, was so misleading that it might violate the terms of the network's broadcast licence.