To Dissent Is Our Right

To the editor,
   My husband and I were watching the NBC nightly news and saw the segment on protesters being arrested. As we watched in horror the peaceful demonstrators being handcuffed and hauled off to jail, both of us experienced a chill of what seemed like to us a grave error and injustice. My husband then brought up an important comparison with the time he had spent in the Navy in the Philippines in the 1980s while it was under the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos. It was made clear to him that whenever he was off of the base that he was not to discuss politics or say anything derogatory about the government and in particular about Marcos or they would call the cops and have you thrown in jail. It was simply not allowed, and the United States government could not guarantee what may come of you if such a thing were to occur. Now this vague description of a terrorist in respect to the PATRIOT Act and the arrests and or interrogations of those who are merely displaying their discontent with the Bush administration put in question if it is indeed a democratic state we live in or a dictatorship like my husband witnessed while in the Philippines. I hear people are being hassled by the FBI for speaking ill of our government at all. This is a frightening fact that needs to be addressed. Dissent has and always will be part of our constitutional rights as Americans, and this freedom that Bush keeps speaking about for Iraq is shown in a weakened state on our very own soil. I feel shame for Bush and Cheney and rage at the hypocrisy of proclaiming freedom for all when it doesn't seem to be something that our own people can exercise without fear of incarceration.