Another One Against Common Sense

The signs appearing on the side of the road are disgusting, vile and hurtful. Upon seeing them, emotions already strained to the limit, strain even more, reaching the air-trigger level.
“Thank God for dead soldiers” and “thank God for IEDs” in eye-catching colors pollute the roadside as this miscreants self identified Christians attempt to make the strongest impact on the public to support their insane, evil agenda.
This is the modus operandi of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas. The scope for their protest is to bring attention to the fact that dead soldiers are God’s punishment for the Military acceptance of gays and lesbians in the Military.
Should the protest be conducted in some shopping mall or in front of some government building, these disgraceful excuses for human beings would probably be just ignored or derided.
So to make a true impact, they stage their protest at the funeral services of Military personnel that has been killed in action.

The impact of their actions falls solely on the family and friends of the fallen, as in that setting no person is really much concerned about the gay/lesbian policy of our Armed Forces. The sole concern is for the family of the person being buried.

When the WBC started this disgraceful display of callousness and pure hatred filled behavior, some of those who were attending the funerals were justifiably angry about it and in some cases they even resorted to violence against the protesters. This was exactly the goal, as the protesters always have someone taking videos and they sue those that take matters in their own hands. That is the way this so-called church funds itself.

As the news of these events begun to spread, some of the American Legion Riders decided that it was not right and they begun to show up at funerals and stand in front of the protestors with American flags to shield families and friends from having to even see them. And they would rev their motorcycles engines to drown the disgusting chants.
While one must be a Veteran to be part of the ALR, many non-Vets wanted to volunteer for these protective missions, so the Patriot Guard Riders was founded.
This is a group of American volunteers, Veterans and civilians, motorcycle riders and not, and most of all a completely non-political group. Anyone can be part of the PGR as the only requirement is to insure that the funerals of those who paid the ultimate price in the service of their country will be free of any disruption and the family will be allowed to mourn their loved one in as much peace as possible. Patriot Guard Riders have and will accomplish their missions in a non violent, non confrontational manner.

Clearly disgusted by the actions of the WBC, the state of Missouri had legislated a ban on any kind of protest at Military funerals. The WBC appealed and the ruling was blocked by the Eighth US Circuit Court of Appeals which believed the protection of the freedom of speech was paramount to the application of the US Constitution. So the case went all the way up to the US Supreme Court.
On June 29, 2009, the US Supreme Court refused to hear the case, basically handing a victory to the WBC, who has been effectively cleared to continue their nefarious actions.

So this is the law as the protection of free speech clause of the US Constitution has to apply even to something so appalling as these sub-human hateful expressions. So the mission of the Patriot Guard Riders continues until the last member of the Military is home. And as far as the American Judicial System and the Supreme Court, this represents just another mark against any plausible common sense.


And these are my thoughts!
Frank “Semperpapa”