Richard Perle, a leading Bush propagandist for invading Iraq to rid the world of his Weapons of Mass Destruction, now says it doesn’t matter if there were none. Like most big political players in Bush’s war, he’s connected to a US defence company whose profits depend on war, but unlike most he was forced to resign this year from the Pentagon’s advisory Defense Policy Board after the New Yorker exposed a conflict between his public and business interests.

The Anglo Coalition now reckons it doesn’t matter that its stated reason for war was false, and that the factual basis for the stated reason was, to put it generously, severely beaten up. Perle suggested this week that the stated reason was adopted so the Coalition could argue that invading Iraq was legal. Lie to be legal!

“The war was appropriate, even if no weapons are found, and even if there were no weapons – because we liberated 23 million people and opened the door to a tremendously important change in the region. The policy of containment had failed. Saddam was a brutal dictator who used weapons of mass destruction [in the past], and leaving him in place would have been dangerous.”

So where does that leave the people of Australia – the victims of the scam?

Australia’s democracy looks pretty darn hopeless compared to the British and US democracies in getting the truth about the real reasons we invaded Iraq and in achieving accountability from the perpetrators of the big lies.

John Howard’s got help, of course. Start with a paralysed opposition and abjectly compliant ministers and backbenchers who collectively turned their backs on the people who elected them. Add his media propagandists – Rupert Murdoch and a bevy of talkback radio boosters – and a press gallery more intent on scoring the game than getting the truth. Toss in a weak Parliamentary committee system and Howard’s willingness to ignore or subvert its processes and presto, he’s getting away with it scot free.

What are disappointed Australians supposed to do? Give up? Retreat to the garden or the home renovations? Howard’s won everything if they do. He wants a detached electorate which has given up on honesty in politics, because then he’s a shoe-in next election on the devil-you-know principle.

I’ve been brooding on an email from K.E. last week:

This government frightens and outrages me. I smell Nazism every day in the news and I want to know where to go to meet like-minded people to talk, to protest, and if necessary in the long run, to revolt. I don’t know where to find people like this. Most of my friends seem passive and only minimally concerned. Do you know of any action groups or how one can become politically active?

So when I got an email from the North Shore Peace Group network offering a seat at a war forum starring Tony Abbott I decided to find out exactly how they’d managed to get a senior minister to front voters on Truth and Democracy: Casualties of War?, to my knowledge a first! He’ll join Sydney Labor left MP Tanya Plibersek, Peter Macdonald – the independent who gave Abbott a run for his money at the 2001 election – and local human shield Donna Mulhearn at North Sydney’s council chambers on Monday to front 200 local residents with tough questions to which they expect answers.

David and Sue Roffey, of the wealthy Sydney North Shore suburb of Mosman, decided to give direct democracy a go in January. Sue was concerned that no-one in Mosman seemed to have known about last November’s march against the war, “so I put a small ad. in the Mosman Daily saying ‘I oppose the war, anyone else?'” Six people met round the Roffey dinner table soon after, and the Mosman peace group was born.

The power of the Mosman group, like other North Shore peace groups, is that it’s genuinely cross political. Most active members don’t belong to any party and they vote Green, Labor, Democrats and Liberal. The group’s most prominent political supporter is John Valder, a former head of the NSW Liberal Party and Howard backer, who’s attended many of the group’s functions and will ask a question at the forum. The Mosman peace group has found common ground, and local activist groups who can boast that have enormous power to get a yes from their local MP.

To let Mosman know they’d arrived, group members attended local markets with placards and purple ribbons which sold like hotcakes. The $600 they raised bought T-Shirts. ‘North Shore against the war” and “Think again, John”, were the polite, very North shore slogans. Sue, a psychologist, said the groups modus operandi was “respect for other people’s points of view”.

“We wanted to stand up and be counted – if individuals don’t do it then groups don’t do it and people’s don’t do it,” she said. A Mosman student created their website, now a bulletin board for peace groups across the North Shore. Its motto is a quote from Martin Luther King: “Our lives begin to end when we become silent about things that matter.”

The group’s goal was to see 100 Mosman residents at the February March. They knew they’d succeeded when the ferry was packed to the rafters on the day.

As the tanks neared Baghdad in April, David and another member of the group asked for an appointment with their federal MP, Tony Abbott. To his credit, Abbott didn’t insult his constituents with form replies. They had a long conversation in which Abbott revealed that he’d been mugged by Cabinet for daring to say in Parliament that invading Iraq could increase the risk of terrorism. Think about that for a minute. Still trust John Howard with our national security? We found out much later that the British Joint Intelligence Committee, the premier intelligence adviser to Tony Blair, thought exactly the same thing. Howard claims our intelligence body, the ONA, didn’t bother to send him the JIC report and instead threw it “into the mix”, a mix he has not yet disclosed.

David and Sue asked Abbott if he’d be on a panel to debate the issues when the war was over. He agreed.

The Roffeys, along with many other Australians, were deeply frustrated with John Howard’s pretence that he hadn’t promised George Bush Australia was all the way with the USA if it invaded Iraq even without UN sanction, and that Howard used that pretence to refuse to discuss issues arising out of possible UN refusal to endorse the war. Howard had stymied Australia’s premier journalists with that ploy, and thus the Australian people’s desire for debate on an issue of grave concern to us all. David – a retired telecommunications consultant now studying political economy – and many others emailed their questions to the PM. His method of avoiding answers is grotesque in its contempt. Howard’s people replied to all emails with questions on the war by saying he’d referred them to the foreign minister Alexander Downer. Downer didn’t reply. Not ever.

Now Tony Abbott will. All the journos, columnists, Labor ‘strategists’ and newspaper editors who think Australians don’t care about the war any more might be interested to learn that all 200 tickets for the war forum were taken before David and Sue got around to placing ads in the Mosman Daily. People are interested, alright, if they think there’s a chance they’ll get answers.

The Mosman Group isn’t interested in catching out the pollie or in stunts or oneupmanship. They’ve modelled the forum on a BBC radio show which brings together pollies, experts, and activists for a weekly discussion on big issues with interested voters.

Everyone on the Mosman group mailing list was asked to submit questions. The organising committee distilled six themes, composed six questions and assigned someone to ask them. The panelists know them in advance, and they are published on the website. Pollies who want to avoid question can be picked up by subsequent speakers or by the questioner, who has a right of reply. The questions are:

1. Since it is now clear that WMD was only a pretext for the US to invade and occupy Iraq, what safeguards need to be in place to ensure that in future such a momentous decision is not left to one person or a small group? How can there be more accountability for such actions?

2. A US Army manual defines terrorism as: “The calculated use of violence or the threat of violence to attain goals that are political, religious, or ideological in nature. This is done through intimidation, coercion, or instilling fear.” Do you agree? How broadly can this definition be applied?

3. Many Australians feel profoundly dis-empowered and disillusioned by the process that led to Australia’s involvement in the attack on Iraq. What prospects are there for the restoration of people’s faith in democracy?

4. How have the past policies of developed western countries (particularly the US and UK) towards the Middle East played a role in fostering the problems we now face, such as the terrorism of Islamic groups such as al-Qaeda?

5. Have Australia’s long term interests been served by our involvement in the war against Iraq? What is our future as a nation if we continue our current allegiance to the US agenda at the expense of broader international relationships?

6. How has Australia been served by its media and how they have covered these issues?

What’s the point?

Sue: “I believe our culture is determined by discourse. What people talk about and the way they talk about it determines their actions. We need to maintain an alternative way of talking about the war at a time when a uniform, government-led discourse is dominating the media.”

After the first phase of the Iraq war, when Saddam’s statue fell, the Mosman group decided not to oppose the occupation because it was pointless to do so. “We’re solutions focused,” David said, so they now focus on what the government’s behaviour means for democracy in Australia and the relevance of truth in our political discourse. They hope their next forum will be on the media’s role in the mess.

But David and Sue have a bigger goal – to inspire voters in other seats to ask their MPs to front the people who voted them in and answer their questions. If our leaders play clever avoidance games with media questioners and bestow most of their media time on their media cheerleaders, then what’s a voter to do but seek accountability direct?

David maintains the website and is happy to help anyone who’d like to start their own group. His email is mail@sydneypeace.com

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Details of the Don’t Be Bush Whacked! hoedown at Prince Alfred Park on Sunday afternoon are at NSWpeace

For Bush events in other states see: Melbourne, Adelaide, ACT, Perth, Launceston, Hobart

There’s a list of national contacts at vicpeace

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Sue Roffey’s field in psychology is “emotional literacy” and “emotional intelligence”. This is her outline of an emotionally literate community:

* shows that it values the diversity of its members

* gives people a chance to be heard

* provides opportunities for participation

* encourages and provides for the establishment of support networks

* uses conflict resolution techniques to manage differences

* makes consequences for wrong doing fair and clear

* makes decisions that are in the community interest rather than in the interest of one (powerful) sector

* provides equal opportunities in reality as well as on paper

* expects all individuals to be aware of community responsibility

An emotionally literate society:

* has transparent government

* has laws based on values of humanity and equality

* has politicians who are solution focused, not blame focused

* is pro-active in early intervention for issues that may have a negative and often expensive outcome

* makes efforts to understand and address the reasons why people behave the way they do

* treats people with respect and humanity even while disapproving of behaviour

* acknowledges the importance of feelings and emotional literacy – gives this a high profile and provides education at every level

* has a media which is responsible, provides balance and is aware of its impact on feelings and public discourse