But, frankly, we can't see why Anderson cannot do both - play host and protester-in-chief, just not at the same time.

He could welcome the president to Salt Lake City, where Bush will address the American Legion convention. Then Anderson could rocket off to join the protest at Washington Square. That's pretty much what he did at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention a year ago.

However, the guys at the American Legion have pre-empted that scenario by disinviting the mayor to give the community welcome at their convention. Instead, they have invited Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon to do the honors.

In one way, this is the best outcome. It relieves Mayor Anderson of his hosting duties, which both he and the president may have found distasteful under the circumstances, and leaves Rocky free to vent his spleen at the protest. We would guess that Emily Post would applaud any compromise that avoided an embarrassing scene.

Still, we don't think Mayor Anderson's important duty to be a good host necessarily means that he must muzzle his political views. Rather, it's a matter of what ceremonial role the mayor is playing at a given time, if any.

That said, deference to a guest, even when he is the president of the United States, does not require deference, in another venue, to the man's policies, particularly when they have been as disastrous as Bush's in Iraq. On that score, there has been entirely too much deference in the United States lately.

The hurly-burly of ideas is the essence of democratic government, and it can cut both ways. Thirty years ago, some American Legion conventioneers booed Jimmy Carter, then the Democratic presidential nominee, when he proposed a blanket pardon for draft evaders from the Vietnam era. Carter is an Annapolis graduate and veteran. He was a guest at the convention. But some vets didn't like his policy, and they let him know it.

That was their right, even their patriotic duty. Just as it is Rocky Anderson's.