Just imagine. You get the Prime Minister, Attorney General Philip Ruddock, Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone, Minister for Citizenship John Cobb, the AFP and ASIO bosses and 13 Muslim leaders. You put them in a committee room in Parliament House for two hours and they emerge holding hands and singing “It’s a small world.”

It’s hard to spy the peak of the platitudes from yesterday’s terrorism summit – but The Australian had a good go. “Is this a record? In the opening address from John Howard to the meeting with Muslim leaders yesterday, the Prime Minister managed 21 references to Australia or Australians in just over 6½ minutes,” Jane Fraser wrote in the Strewth column. My country, right or wrong? That’s what the PM’s preview – “our common values as Australians transcend any other allegiances or commitments” – seems to suggest. But what did the summit actually achieve?

Thirteen Muslims. Wander the streets – you’ll see African Muslims, Bosnian Muslims, Indonesian Muslims, Lebanese Muslims, Turkish Muslims, Arab Muslims, Pakistani Muslims… and Australian Muslims, too. Thirteen “community leaders” to represent all of these groups?

God knows what the world’s coming to when a post-modern Tory anarchist like me starts agreeing with Age editorials, but they had a few good points today. “The power of yesterday’s summit lay mainly in its symbolism of a united front against a common enemy. Muslim leaders had the opportunity to publicly affirm their commitment to democratic ideals, and to tell the Federal Government how it could help crack down on the preachers of hate. The Government could in turn reassure ordinary Muslims, however devout, that they are regarded as equal and valued Australian citizens… But the politics of inclusion and exclusion, particularly regarding the summit’s guest list, is an inevitably tricky affair. The entire point of the exercise is to devise ways of delegitimising extremists and yet there is always the risk that this snub might have the unfortunate effect of boosting the street cred of extremists.”

But this was the clincher: “We should be wary of setting up Muslim leaders for failure by expecting them to police a 350,000-strong community of more than 60 ethnicities. If we do that, the larger battle for hearts and minds risks being lost in a tide of recrimination.”

Never underestimate the politicisation of various “communities” – interest groups – and the power struggles that rage within them. Muslim leaders have no direct authority over radicals. Getting on a guest list might increase their authority in their power bases – and our wider community – but it mightn’t do much for a safer society.