“I haven’t really run since high school, but this wasn’t difficult at all,” said Tisdale, jogging in circles to cool down as drivers honked loudly at the sight of his pasty rear end.

“I’m already looking forward to next week.”

It was a brisk jog, rather than an all-out sprint, with which Tisdale took to the streets  with the words “Freedumb Run” and a peace symbol tattooed in henna across his bare back. His purpose? To speak out against President George W. Bush, the war in Iraq and maybe, just maybe, start a revolution in the process.

“I remember the old hippie days, when people always used to protest in all kinds of creative ways,” he said. “You don’t see anybody doing anything like that anymore. There’s just a general apathy that gets in the way of anyone rising up and saying anything. I have to give it a shot.”

And so, he ran.

The apathy of which Tisdale spoke was on full display as he jogged; despite the fact that he was wearing nothing but a too-tight thong, Nike running shoes and a pair of sunglasses, very few people — from the federal courthouse to the Miami Dade College campus — seemed to notice. Those who did chuckled, and soon turned away, bewildered.

“I took a picture for my MySpace page,” said one female Miami Dade College student named Lasonta after the patriotic protestor zoomed by. “His ass looked funny.”

“Whatever,” said Miami Police Officer Martinez, who refused to give his first name. “He’s not naked, so it’s not a crime. Let him do what he wants.”

None of the disinterest or amused disgust seemed to bother Tisdale, however. This was about taking a stand and making a point, personal humiliation be damned.

“In the beginning, I wanted to do this with a bag on my head,” he said. “I’m a modest person who doesn’t even like to wear a tank top. This is absolutely embarrassing for me, but it’s in no way as embarrassing as what we’re doing in the Middle East right now.”

And so, he ran.

A self-employed lumberjack by day, 44-year-old Tisdale has been fuming for months over the state of the nation. To him, as to many, many others, there’s far more at play in Iraq and in the White House than can be gleaned through the nightly news. He believes there’s profiteering at work here; that old men are sending young men to die for the establishment of a new, profitable empire; that the bloodthirsty bad guys and the supposed good guys are all in cahoots, trafficking in blood and oil at the expense of the common man in both America and Iraq.

“They say this war is for freedom, that all this death and destruction is      for freedom,” Tisdale said. “Therefore, I decided that I’m going to celebrate my own freedom in a thong and see how far I get.”

It involved telling his friends and ­family, some of whom were more than a little ­disturbed. Others eventually came around, throwing their support behind him, though cautiously.

“They thought it was a little out there, but my girlfriend is helping me out,” Tisdale said. “She doesn’t want me to go to jail though, and, trust me, I don’t either, especially in this thong. But it’s worth the risk.”

No matter how dangerous his endeavor, Tisdale doesn’t plan on quitting anytime soon. For something like this to work, he believes it has to build, grow and become a movement. Next Friday at noon, he’ll once again be out on the corner of Southwest First Street and Southwest First Avenue, right in front of the federal courthouse in his patriotic thong. And he hopes to have a few others with him.

“If someone gets out there and does something with a little bit of silliness attached to it, it just might get something going, it might inspire people, and that’s why I’m doing this. It has to start ­somewhere,” Tisdale said. “I have to believe that. Who knows, maybe we’ll get a Million Man Freedumb Run on the Capitol at some point.”