08-30-2010 PHELPS CLAN GETS NATIONAL EXPOSURE Fred Phelps and members of his Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka are once-again helping portray the State of Kansas as a national joke by being featured in USA Today (8/30). LINK TO STORY AND VIDEO. The group, famous for protesting at military funerals for maximum exposure for their message of hate, is being sued by Albert Snyder, father of a 20-year-old for protesting outside his son's funeral in 2006. The group picketed the funeral with anti-gay slogans despite the fact Snyder's son was not gay. "Snyder says, he can't separate such moments from the memory that his only son's funeral was picketed by fundamentalist pastor Fred Phelps and his followers with an inflammatory message that had nothing to do with Matthew," says USA Today. Phelps says it is his church's First Amendment right to protest at funerals and other events. While several military and civilian groups oppose their antics, the ACLU is a supporter.
08-31-2010 HATE EVERYBODY "There's a misperception among many that the Phelps bunch are right-wing extremists. But if you look into the background of Fred Phelps you'll find that he's been a life-long democrat. Phelps was a delegate for Al Gore at the 1988 Democratic Convention, and he garnered 31% of the vote when he ran for US Senate in the 1992 Kansas Democratic primary. "So, as recently as 1992, 31% of voting democrats saw something they liked about Fred Phelps. Currently, the Phelps clan seem to defy any conventional political label. They seem to hate everybody and everything, and use the legal system to intimidate those that stand up to them." --- Kevin Peterson
09-01-2010 PHELPS' ANTICS DON'T REFLECT ON KS "It’s a stretch to assume that Phelps’ notoriety affects Kansas’ ability to attract and retain people and companies. For one, the USA Today story doesn’t even mention Kansas. It does mention Topeka, but considering the decades of lamentations about Americans’ geographic ignorance, I’ve got to wonder how many of them even know that it’s a city in Kansas. "For another, every state has a high-profile individual, group, legislation, law or incident that its residents decry as giving them a black eye on the national stage. If Kansans aren’t wringing their hands over Phelps, they’re worrying about what people elsewhere think about the Kansas State Board of Education’s position on evolution. If they go to California, they’ll find the same self-flagellation over Proposition 8. "Ditto for Arizonans over the the new immigration law or New Yorkers over the police shooting of Amadou Diallo, whose death got even more national exposure as the subject of a Springsteen song. There are plenty of other examples. "With the possible exception of Arizona’s immigration law, have any of these had a significant negative impact on a state’s ability to attract and retain people and companies? For example, has Sprint ever failed to recruit a top candidate because that person objected to working for a company based in a state that’s home to Fred Phelps and an education board that’s critical of evolution? Are companies fleeing NYC because Amadou Diallo’s death gave that town a black eye? Is California losing residents because of Prop 8? "Regardless of how one feels about this or that, it’s mostly a waste of time to fret over what people in other states think." ---Tim Kridel
Copyright 2010 Bottom Line Communications. BLC is a Media News Web site that analyzes media and marketing issues. Please give credit or link to http://www.bottomlinecom.com when using any materials. Click on the FEEDBACK tab to send any media tips/comments/thoughts to us. We honor all off-the-record requests and will correct/clarify any information found not to be 100% accurate.
