What a bunch of sick people......

[WilliamTell]

This happened in Ogden, Iowa. I can't care if you support the war or don't suppor it, I hope everyone can agree that this is sickning.

 

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs...005/1001/NEWS10

 

Prior to this morning's funeral, a group of nine demonstrators stood in plain view of arriving mourners 530-feet away, across the street from the high school. The three teenage women, four adult women, one adult male and one young boy left their spot on the windswept road without incident at 10:04, or four minutes after the scheduled beginning of Sesker's funeral.

 

Displaying placards that declared, "You're Going To Hell,'' "*** Vets,'' and "Thank God for Dead Soldiers,'' the group was far enough away to be in compliance with legislation enacted Monday outlawing protests near funerals in Iowa.

[juddling]

i don't have the newspaper with me but that church group from Kansas is planning to protest in a funeral or two in illinois in the next week or two.

 

That's why the illinois goverment was trying to rush through a bill to make it illegal to protest within a certain amount of feet of a funeral. That bill is hung up at the moment(last i heard) and doesn't look like it will be passed in time for the funerals here.

 

It's sad....but a small group of people doing to protesting. They enjoy the press the are getting but i'm surprised that someone hasn't walked over and just started kicking someone's ass. not that i condone such actions

 

 

GOD BLESS OUR VETS!!!!!!

 

 

[Soxfest]

I saw these dumbasses on TV with there signs very sick f***ed up indivisuals :finger idiots.

[juddling]

here's a bit more details.....

 

 

SPRINGFIELD — A bill to bar demonstrations 200 feet from cemeteries and funeral homes has hit a snag with the American Civil Liberties Union and a labor union representing gravediggers.

 

But its Senate sponsors believe a deal to stop a fundamentalist Kansas church from picketing soldiers' funerals in Illinois can still be struck before the Legislature's expected adjournment in the next two weeks.

 

"I'm hopeful that by the end of the week, we can have something worked out. If we can't, that would be unfortunate," said Sen. Arthur J. Wilhelmi, D-Crest Hill. "It's my goal to make sure all parties can walk away with a win-win."

 

Illinois is among at least 14 states that have attempted to crack down on protests at military funerals by Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., which believes soldiers killed in action died for a country that supports homosexuality.

 

The legislation has stalled in the Senate amid First Amendment concerns by the ACLU and worries by the Service Employees International Union that picketing by cemetery employees in potential labor disputes could be hindered.

 

Senate Republicans called on the chamber's Democratic leadership to set aside those issues and allow an immediate floor vote after the initiative won nearly unanimous backing in the House this month.

 

"We want to see this bill moved out of the Senate Rules Committee," said Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon. "This is quite simply a very easy, very decent thing we can do for families who have given up so much for the sake of their country overseas."

 

Sen. Chris Lauzen, R-Aurora, is a chief co-sponsor of House Bill 4532, which is backed by Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn, a Democrat. The bill would establish the "Let Them Rest in Peace Act" to prohibit loud and inflammatory protests within 200 feet of all Illinois funeral services beginning 30 minutes before a funeral, during a funeral, and 30 minutes after the funeral.

 

"We shouldn't be playing politics with such an important issue," Lauzen said. "This bill should be released to the full Senate for individual members to decide on a 'yes' or 'no.'"

 

Senate President Emil Jones, D-Chicago, supports the legislation, and his spokeswoman, Cindy Davidsmeyer, downplayed GOP concerns that the issue would stay bottled up beyond the Legislature's expected adjournment.

 

"Just as appropriate limits are set on free speech to prevent someone from yelling 'fire' in a movie theater, there needs to be safeguards in place to prevent the desecration of a soldier's funeral just to advance a political agenda," said Lauzen.

 

Lauzen was convinced to sponsor the measure after learning that protestors threatened to picket the funeral of Marine Lance Cpl. Adam Wade Kaiser, 19, of Naperville, who was killed in Iraq last year.

 

03/29/06

[mr_genius]

yea, these psychos have been doing this for a while now

 

it needs to stop

[Texsox]

This is so wrong on so many levels. Let's start with simple human decency, compassion, and empathy. I saw the protestors on TV and was ashamed that we are from the same species.

 

I appreciate the ACLU fighting this on freedom of speech grounds, I hope they lose, and the resulting law is iron clad.

 

And I can't believe this needs to be in the "buster". How anyone could possibly defend these "protesters" is beyond me.

[WilliamTell]

This is so wrong on so many levels. Let's start with simple human decency, compassion, and empathy. I saw the protestors on TV and was ashamed that we are from the same species.

 

I appreciate the ACLU fighting this on freedom of speech grounds, I hope they lose, and the resulting law is iron clad.

 

And I can't believe this needs to be in the "buster". How anyone could possibly defend these "protesters" is beyond me.

 

Well move it if you don't want it hear. You never know though.

[Texsox]

Well move it if you don't want it hear. You never know though.

 

I wrote that wrong, this is probably the correct forum, I'm just thinking there can't be any controversy here.

[FlaSoxxJim]

I wrote that wrong, this is probably the correct forum, I'm just thinking there can't be any controversy here.

 

I wouldn't think so either. Really sick, ignorant group of whackos who don't deserve anybody's respect.

[kapkomet]

I think we all can agree that voicing dissent is one thing, to completely piss on the soldier and thier family is absolutely intolerable.

[Texsox]

I think we all can agree that voicing dissent is one thing, to completely piss on the soldier and thier family is absolutely intolerable.

 

[bmags]

the bill should work because of Time, Manner, Place precedent right?

[kapkomet]

the bill should work because of Time, Manner, Place precedent right?

???

[GoodAsGould]

Wow that is so wrong.....

[bmags]

???

 

they can't prevent a group from picketing, but if it will cause an unusual amount of disturbance...

 

i don't know, we got an example that the gov can impose restrictions on a rally that would happen at 1 am in a neighborhood...

 

it seems like this could be considered the same amount of diress

 

hopefully the billwriting wasn't rushed and could be considered overreaching

[AngelasDaddy0427]

Protesters at this morning's funeral said they were members of Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan. Members began protesting at soldiers’ funerals in June, claiming that God is killing the soldiers because the United States and U.S. military condone homosexuality.

 

This is the part of that article that desturbed me most. Forgive my language but what kind of f***ed up church does this. I think then must of missed the part about forgiveness and not judging people.

[YASNY]

I'm sorry, but if someone did this to my family I'd be over there kicking some serious ass ... jail or no jail. Period.

[southsider2k5]

I'm sorry, but if someone did this to my family I'd be over there kicking some serious ass ... jail or no jail.  Period.

 

^^^^

 

There is no way one of us would make it through the funeral. Someone would be meeting their maker...

[Texsox]

This is the part of that article that desturbed me most. Forgive my language but what kind of f***ed up church does this. I think then must of missed the part about forgiveness and not judging people.

 

The "church", from what I saw on the TV program, is their house and the congregation is their family. Could we replace them with a couple illegal, but hardworking, immigrants?

[Texsox]

I'm sorry, but if someone did this to my family I'd be over there kicking some serious ass ... jail or no jail.  Period.

 

 

^^^^

 

There is no way one of us would make it through the funeral.  Someone would be meeting their maker...

 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

I'd filibust someone's head and feel pretty damn good about it. And, at least here in Texas, as long as I wasn't drunk, I bet I wouldn't even see the inside of a jail.

[southsider2k5]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

I'd filibust someone's head and feel pretty damn good about it. And, at least here in Texas, as long as I wasn't drunk, I bet I wouldn't even see the inside of a jail.

 

In Texas the cops would probably give you some asskicking hints, if not just do it for you.

[Texsox]

In Texas the cops would probably give you some asskicking hints, if not just do it for you.

 

And no one would have seen anything . . .

[KansasSoxFan]

Delurking to say that there was a thread in Soxtalk about these loonies last year. Unfortunately, they live in my home state so I hear about them regularly. My local paper, the Wichita Eagle, did a profile on them recently if you care to know more about them. Half of this family is made up of lawyers and they have sued and won money from the state before.

 

 

http://www.kansas.com/mld/eagle/living/religion/14243282.htm

 

Road to Westboro

What led Fred Phelps to his beliefs and actions?

BY FRED MANN

The Wichita Eagle

Fred Phelps says he was called to serve God when he was 16.

Kelly Glasscock/The Wichita Eagle

Fred Phelps says he was called to serve God when he was 16.

More photos

 

    * Three Phelps children are on state's payroll

    * What others have said about Fred Phelps

    * Now you know: The Phelps family

    * Editor: Why The Eagle wrote this story

 

It is a quiet family Sunday. Boys toss a football in the yard. Children scramble on playground equipment. Their moms and dads, aunts and uncles clean up after a birthday party.

 

The family's patriarch reposes comfortably behind a large mahogany desk in a long rectangular workroom next to the sanctuary of his church.

 

Pastor Fred Phelps, 76 and somewhat wilted after a fire-and-brimstone sermon that blistered the walls and all but rolled up the thin red carpets, is talking about quiet times like this. Quiet times when all of us think about life and death, heaven and hell, our place in the universe.

 

In such moments, Phelps says, he finds great solace in knowing he is almost universally despised.

 

"If I had nobody mad at me," he says softly in his Mississippi drawl, "what right would I have to claim that I was preaching the gospel?"

 

America has heard him and recoiled. At least 27 states are considering laws to ban or restrict picketing at soldiers' funerals. Such picketing is Phelps' latest effort to spread his message that God has turned against America for harboring homosexuality.

 

Phelps has been called the vilest of the vile, inhuman, even insane. He considers this evidence of his righteousness, proof that he is preaching the truth of God.

 

"'Blessed are ye when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you and cast out your name,' " Phelps says, quoting from the Gospel of Luke. "Rejoice in that day and leap for joy!"

 

The funeral picketing has focused national attention on his church, Westboro Baptist, and the complex on Topeka's southwest side where Phelps and some of his children and grandchildren live in modest wood houses surrounded by chain-link and wood fencing.

 

The fencing creates a spacious yard with a swimming pool, running track, tennis and basketball courts, and the playground.

 

Above the compound, an American flag flies upside down, the signal for distress. Above that a Canadian flag flies upside down, Phelps' response to a Canadian law prohibiting picketing at funerals there.

 

Phelps, who has changed from his preacher's outfit -- gray sport coat and black tie -- and put on a University of Kansas windbreaker, says he and his family have picketed more than 25,000 times since 1991. That's when they started a crusade against homosexual activity in nearby Gage Park after Phelps said the city failed to heed letters he wrote for two years.

 

In fact, if the city had cleaned up the park as he'd asked, Phelps says, the family probably wouldn't picket anything today.

 

Instead, people showed up at the park to protest Phelps' picketing, and Phelps declared war.

 

Since then, the family has picketed the funerals of Matthew Shepard, a gay man who was beaten to death in Wyoming; gay men who died of AIDS; miners who died in the Jan. 2 Sago Mine disaster; Frank Sinatra; Barry Goldwater; Mr. Rogers; and Coretta Scott King.

 

They spend a quarter of a million dollars on airfare each year, Phelps says. It is paid by the family, which includes 10 attorneys among 13 children.

 

"We do not ask for anything from anyone," says one of Phelps' daughters, Shirley Phelps-Roper, a lawyer for the family firm, Phelps-Chartered. "And we will not take anything from anyone. We pay our own way."

 

Along the wall next to Phelps is a table with a computer, fax machine and printer. They are the tools Phelps and his family use to send out their message, to find out from the Pentagon which soldiers have died and where and when they will be buried, and to track the growing number of state laws aimed at them.

 

It's also how they receive daily feedback from the world beyond the church's walls.

 

"We get thousands of e-mails every day, most of it just raising Cain," Phelps says. "Nasty stuff."

 

From his chair behind the desk, Phelps smiles at all the hatred.

 

"I knew it was coming," he says. "I counted the costs, and I'm daily paying the installments. And it's a bargain."

 

Phelps leans forward, placing his hands with their long, slender fingers on the desk. He asks his listener to repeat what he has just said. He wants to remember it so he can say it again.

 

Then his face spreads in a smile that colors ruddy, jutting cheekbones.

 

"I knew it was going to happen because the Bible says it's going to be that way," Phelps continues. "Noah preached for 120 years. The flood came, and he hadn't convinced anybody.

 

"I knew," says Phelps, "that there wasn't anybody going to believe this."

 

'Profound determination'

 

Phelps wasn't always hated. He remembers when he used to be popular. Medals he received from the American Legion for character, honor and courage as a high school senior hang on the wall of his workroom.

 

"If it occurs to them, they'll probably want me to give them back," he says.

 

Born in 1929, the son of a railroad detective in Meridian, Miss., Phelps was an A student who finished sixth in his class of 216. He was class orator, an Eagle Scout and one of the top prep high hurdlers in Mississippi.

 

But today, Phelps can walk around his rambling wood-framed church, which is exempt from real estate taxes, and point out the bullet holes in the church sign, and talk about the vandalism, including a 1995 pipe bomb.

 

"I knew the value of everybody liking you," Phelps says. "The human emotion of wanting to be liked is there. But it is not dominating my life, I'm very thankful to say."

 

Popularity is an unworthy goal for a Calvinist preacher, he believes. They stress the absolute sovereignty of God's will; they believe that only those whom God specifically elects are saved, and that individuals can do nothing to effect this salvation.

 

Phelps was 16 when he received the call to preach. He had been appointed to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, but he had to wait until he was 17 to attend. He and a friend stopped in at a revival meeting at a Methodist church, and Phelps had a religious experience that he described as "an impulse on the heart." He scrapped plans for West Point.

 

"There was aroused in me at that time -- one who had wanted to go to West Point ever since junior high -- a profound determination that I was going to preach the word of God," Phelps says. "And that has not flagged from then till now."

 

Phelps has contempt for preachers like Jerry Falwell and Billy Graham who he says like being popular and no longer preach the message that man is depraved and can't save himself.

 

"Man has no free will," Phelps says. "The savior says, if you think you got free will, grow a foot and a half."

 

Phelps still gets a chuckle out of Falwell, who recently appeared on TV in Virginia and declared Phelps insane.

 

Phelps and Phelps-Roper call up the segment on the computer and watch it again, Phelps chortling as Falwell utters "insane" one more time.

 

He has picketed Falwell twice.

 

Phelps enrolled in Bob Jones University instead of West Point. But he never attended classes there. He went to a Bible institute in Canada for a short time before moving to Pasadena, Calif., where he received a theology degree from John Muir College.

 

On the office wall is a framed copy of a 1951 Time magazine article with a photo of a 21-year-old Phelps speaking out against necking and petting on campus.

 

Later, Phelps went to Arizona and met and married his wife, Marge, in 1952. Fred Jr. was born in 1953. A year later the family moved to Topeka, where Phelps had been invited to be co-pastor of a Baptist church. After a stormy stay, he founded the Westboro Baptist Church in 1955.

 

To supplement his income, he sold insurance, vacuum cleaners, dictating machines and baby carriages door to door. The family also sold candy to get by.

 

Phelps had arrived in Topeka the day of the U.S. Supreme Court desegregation decision in Brown v. Topeka Board of Education. He took that as a sign he should become a lawyer and do civil rights work.

 

Phelps graduated from Washburn University law school in 1964. By 1969 his license had been suspended. Eventually he was disbarred by the Kansas Supreme Court for activities the court found to be improper in connection with a lawsuit he filed against a Topeka court reporter.

 

He later was disbarred from federal court.

 

Phelps ran for mayor, senator and governor. He lost.

 

But his civil rights work was praised by black groups, and he was once honored by the Bonner Springs Branch of the NAACP.

 

Last month, Phelps picketed the Atlanta funeral of Coretta Scott King.

 

Today, a large poster with her photo, headlined "King in Hell," still sits by his pulpit.

 

"I'm mad at them for turning that movement over to the ***s," Phelps says.

 

'Shepherd of the flock'

 

During his Sunday sermon, Phelps speaks of a CNN reporter who had asked him how Phelps would like it if people picketed his funeral when he dies.

 

Phelps thunders from the pulpit: "I'd love it. I'd invite them. 'Get yourself a sign.' I said: 'I'll put in my will to pay your way. But not first class.' "

 

Phelps has read reports that he's already dead. He's read others that have him dying of any number of ailments.

 

The truth, he says, is that he is in good shape. A former triathlete, Phelps still swims a half-mile a day when the pool outside is open. He rides a stationary bike and "wogs," a combination of walking and jogging.

 

At 6-foot-3, he is still lean, and although he walks with a slight stoop, his preacher's voice is still capable of exploding shrilly to climax a thought.

 

"Get right with God!" he shrieks to the flock in the small sanctuary, which contains about 50 people, almost all family members.

 

The church has roughly 75 members, of which 80 percent are related to Phelps by blood or marriage, said Shirley Phelps-Roper.

 

His children vouch for Phelps' health.

 

"People say he's half dead, but I don't think so," says Fred Phelps Jr., an attorney with the Kansas Department of Corrections. "There's a lot of different images out there. He's very dedicated, very committed, very compassionate, and certainly strong. I remember running a race one time, I was about 25, and he came right past me."

 

Jonathan Phelps, an attorney with Phelps-Chartered, says his father is a very caring person.

 

"It's a privilege to be his son because he has a lot of years of experience you can tap into, and he's ready, willing and able to share it with you so you can get by in this life," Jonathan says."His grandchildren love him to death."

 

But three of Phelps' children left the family long ago and have never returned.

 

Two sons, Mark and Nate, left in the 1970s and now are businessmen in southern California. They could not be reached for comment.

 

A third child, Dortha, left in 1990 at age 25 and changed her last name to Bird. She's a Topeka attorney and deputy administrator of the Kansas Workers Risk Cooperative for Counties.

 

"I felt like I was being controlled, and I didn't have any freedom," Bird says. "And if I didn't follow everything the pastor, or shepherd of the flock, says, I wasn't right with the Lord.

 

"What never ceased to amaze me is he could tear apart a document that was just a few months old as an attorney, yet he sees the Bible as the truth."

 

Bird says she hasn't spoken to anyone in the family since she left.

 

Phelps also has 54 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

 

While he worries about violence against his family at picketings -- he says they've been beaten in other states, and that one was punched in the face by a sheriff in Wisconsin -- Phelps says the Bible has plenty of verses that comfort them in their mission.

 

He laughs off accusations that his children and grandchildren picket only because he has brainwashed them.

 

"Man, I couldn't stop these kids from doing this. They'd get rid of me," he says.

 

"And beside that, they are happy little ducks. It amazes me. They are so enthused about this stuff. You try to keep them away from those pickets, they fight."

 

As for those who left the family, Phelps has turned his back on them and doesn't want to reconcile.

 

"The notion is repulsive to me," he says. "If the wife of your bosom, Moses said, comes to you secretly and says let's go another way, let's share another god, you're supposed to take her to the judges, tell them what she did... and stone her to death."

 

Growing movement

 

On the wall hangs the first sign Phelps held up in Gage Park, with the comparatively restrained message: "Watch your kids. Gays in restrooms."

 

Signs are more inflammatory now, and Phelps knows they hurt mourners.

 

He thanks legislators around the country for passing those laws and bringing attention to the family's message.

 

Phelps refers to the laws popping up around the country as a "popcorn movement," and he wishes Congress would pass a law unifying the rules for his protests.

 

"The federal court could do it, but it'd be better if Congress does it," Phelps says. "I look forward to it. I want to see those jackasses up there wrestle with the First Amendment."

 

Meanwhile, he and his family picket somewhere every day. They picket about 15 churches every Sunday. For pickets within driving distance, they travel in Honda minivans of different colors, with trucks carrying their signs.

 

Phelps says he has no plans to stop picketing, and he has no plans to soften the message.

 

He doesn't know what the future will bring.

 

"I'm just along for the ride," Phelps says.

 

He thinks he is on a roll, gathering strength.

 

Outside, where the grandchildren toss the football and play on the playground, is proof of a growing flock.

 

The birthday party, held in the basement of one of the houses in the compound, celebrated five of the grandkids.

 

Phelps sat quietly during the party, holding 12-week-old great-granddaughter Zion on his knee. He grinned as he peered into her eyes and patted her tummy while the family ate and sang hymns.

 

"Man," Phelps says, "we haven't even got started yet."

Reach Fred Mann at (316) 268-6310 or [email protected].

 

:puke to them, I say.

[Balta1701]

They dropped by a funeral in Portage about a year ago. Same funeral home as we used for my grandparents.

[retro1983hat]

If they happened to be in front of my car as I left the funeral, I would step on the gas HARD. No regrets.