Chicago Alderman leads outcry against protesters at soldier's funeral

The picture on the left was taken at the funeral for Army Specialist Adam Harding of Portage, Indiana, a town near Gary.

Yes, that's right, it reads "Thank God for Dead Soldiers."

Adam was killed in Iraq, and his funeral last week was marred by protesters from the infamous Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, KS.

Westboro Baptist claims that God is killing US soldiers because of American tolerance for homosexuality. The group is led by the Reverend Fred Phelps, who operates this web site, God Hates Fags. On the site, there's a page that thanks God for the London 7/7 bombings, lamenting only that it was unfortunate more people weren't killed or injured.

This group (I really want to avoid calling it a "church") has been around a while, they've acquired a name of sorts for organizing similar protests at funerals of AIDS victims.

On Friday, about 10 idiots from Westboro made the trip to Portage for the protest at Harding's funeral. These 10 are either terribly misguided or just plain evil.

Meanwhile, earlier today Alderman James Balcer of Chicago's 11th Ward organized a protest dencouncing this group. Balcer said of Westboro, "This, I believe, is as low as one can go."

Westboro's Jonathan Phelps (likely a relative of Fred) said this about Harding's combat death:

"Not only am I happy about it, the Bible says you are supposed to wash your feet in the blood of the wicked."

The full story is here, courtesy of NBC 5 Chicago.

UPDATE 11:27 PM August 9. Rich Miller of Capitol Fax has come across this despicable flyer that was handed out in June at the funeral of Simpson, IL soldier Brian Simpson.

Rich has heard reports that the group is headed to Ohio. They were in Portage, IN Friday.
Warning Ohioans: A plague may be coming your way via the Indiana Toll Road.