However, the potential effect of the protests was generally dismissed by pro-war politicians. The Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard, claimed that the protests were not representative of public opinion, saying "I don't know that you can measure public opinion just by the number of people that turn up at demonstrations." In the United States, the then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was reported as saying that the protests would "not affect [the administration's] determination to confront Saddam Hussein and help the Iraqi people".[23]