Anyone living within two miles of Dupont Circle couldn’t have missed the police lockdown last night.

Starting shortly after 9 p.m., D.C. police cruisers took positions along Connecticut Avenue up to the intersection with Florida Avenue, eventually shutting down all traffic — pedestrian and vehicular — without giving an explanation as to why. Two helicopters loudly hovered overhead, while overly anxious police officers screamed loudly at anyone who dared cross the street (a man walking a Golden Retriever and a man riding a folding bike were particularly threatening). Around 10 p.m. a motorcade approached, fronted by police on motorcycles and complemented by the full array of security vehicles — SUVs with armed guards hanging out of open windows, an ambulance, and two matching limos bearing the flags of the United States and Pakistan. President Pervez Musharraf, fresh from a meal with President George W. Bush and Afghani President Hamid Karzai (they apparently enjoyed spicy sea bass and pumpkin cake), was on his way back to the Four Seasons, no doubt to catch the newest installment of Project Runway.

We’ve waxed annoyed all too often on these motorcades. Beyond shutting down traffic in every which direction and making District residents feel like they are potential threats to visiting heads of state, WTOP discovered earlier this year that presidential motorcades, much like that which Musharraf enjoyed, take 40 D.C. police cruisers and two emergency response vehicles out of regular rotation to provide for security along the route. Beyond having the District foot the bill for these motorcades — to the tune of $1.5 million a year — it’s the imagery of that many D.C. police vehicles and officers taken off regular duty during a crime emergency that reminds us how little the safety of the city’s residents might mean to the feds. This isn’t to say that Musharraf and other heads of state don’t deserve motorcades, but that they can stand to do without the show of force that the District pulled out yesterday to ferry him from the White House to the Four Seasons.

Then again, that guy on the folding bike totally looked like he was hiding an anti-limo cannon in his backpack, just like that Golden Retriever made for a great cover for a tactical nuclear warhead.