When did it become un-American to dissent? What is it about freedom of speech and the right to peacefully demonstrate that so many people find so offensive?

Which is more appalling - the truck driver who steers his semi down a sidewalk at a group of protesters, or the crowd of well-wishers who hail him as a hero after he makes bail?

In the words of the great American poet Country Joe McDonald, "What are we fighting for?"

OK, now let's clear something up.

I'm not one of the protesters. Around my house, I'm known as the conservative one. I think Saddam Hussein is an evil that the world will be well rid of and I support our country's efforts to do the dirty work.

But it's not a decision that sits easily, and I sometimes have doubts that it is the right decision. The good thing about this country is that I can voice those doubts. I can sit here and say that I hope the president really knows what he is doing. Or I can even say that he is wrong and the war is a big mistake. I can say that and not worry that somebody is going to come knock on the door and take me away. Nobody is going take me out in the town square, tie me to a post and cut out my tongue because I don't like George W. Bush.

They actually do that in Iraq. And it is starting to concern me that a lot of people seem to think we ought to do it here too.

I see a lot of letters that come into this newspaper every day. Understandably, a good number of them these days are about the war. Lately, many of them are focusing on the protests, and particularly, how we ought to deal with the dissenters.

They want to charge peaceful protesters with crimes. A pop singer expresses her dislike for the president and people stage mass burnings of her music. A member of the United States Senate voices regret over the war and people start talking like he's Benedict Arnold. And then there are people who decide to turn a dumb cluck like Jim Watters into some kind of folk hero.

Watters is the truck driver I mentioned earlier. He jumped his rig onto a West End sidewalk Monday and headed straight for a group of people who had been waving anti-war signs at passing motorists. He stopped about 10 feet shy of mayhem. After his arrest on charges of aggravated menacing, inducing panic and reckless operation, he said he did it for his son, a Marine stationed in Kuwait.

I hope his son comes home safely, and soon enough to visit his father in jail.

Folks like Jim Watters ought to think a little harder about the question posed by old Country Joe.

What we are fighting for is the freedom to live without terror. That means the freedom to say what we believe without being afraid that our houses will be stoned, that our jobs will be jeopardized or that our physical safety will be threatened.

You don't have to like what people say, but you have to be willing to let them say it.

If Michael Moore's statement against the war and the president at the Oscars offended you, you had the option of turning off the television. If you want to go further than that, don't pay good money to see his movies. But you can't run him, and every other Hollywood celebrity, out of the country.

If you don't like that fact that Tom Daschle is "saddened" by the advent of the war, then move to South Dakota and run against him. Short of that you might just keep voting Republican. But he isn't being unpatriotic because he dares to speak of what is on his conscience.

If you are driving down the road and see somebody waving a banner that you don't like, just keep on driving or find another route. But keep your wheels off the sidewalk. Those protesters represent what we are fighting for.

Contact David Wells at 768-8310; fax: 768-8610; e-mail: dwells@enquirer.com