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This morning around 10:15 on the Preston and Steve radio show, they read portions of an email I sent in asking them to publicize a Facebook group encouraging people to donate money to the Matthew Shepard Foundation as an economic counter-protest to the Westboro Baptist Church's protest outside of Cherry Hill East High School in New Jersey (technically considered to be in the Philadelphia area).

I'm working on getting the audio clip from the show, but in the meantime, here's the email that I sent in.

Monday (December 7th), the Westboro Baptist Church — the "God Hates Fags" people — protested at different events and locations all over the Philadelphia area; including outside of Cherry Hill East High School in NJ.

This location is of particular interest because an alumnus of the high school — Melody Kramer — took it upon herself to set up a Facebook group asking people to pledge $1 per minute that the WBC protesters stood outside her alma mater to the Matthew Shepard Foundation (http://www.matthewshepard.org/), instead of protesting back and giving these people the attention they crave. In a matter of days, the group had over 1,400 members, pledging well over $43,000.

The protest has come and gone and happened without much incident. Fortunately, it's never too late to give!

I only hope a few of my fellow WMMR and PnS listeners can find it in their hearts to donate a few dollars to a good cause. I've included some information below.

The facebook group is here: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=214656452473

To donate specifically in recognition of WBC:

• Go to this link
• Click on, "Honor Giving"
• Enter "CHERRY HILL" under the honoree
• Fill out the rest of the form as you otherwise normally would
• If you want to send a polite thank-you note to the folks at WBC, their address is:
  3701 SW 12th St
  Topeka, KS 66604

 

I suggest you keep your messages annoyingly polite, as these people thrive on retaliation and violence. Mine was: "Thank you for helping to raise $35,000 for the Matthew Shepard Foundation through your demonstration at Cherry Hill East High School in New Jersey."

I'm told that they should be able to send me an MP3 of just that portion of the show, and I've requested it. If I don't receive it, I'll check their daily podcast to see if it's included in that, and can isolate it myself. Hopefully I'll be able to get it for you one way or another.

I'm intentionally not linking to the Westboro Baptist Church's website, as they make money from advertising, and that would indirectly fund their efforts. Instead, if you're looking for information on them, I encourage you to check the news instead. (Or search for "Westboro Baptist Church" on Google News).

This originally started as a Sideblog post, but I guess I have more to say about it than I had originally thought. When I had finished writing it, I realized it was entirely too long to stick over there. I'm kind of disgusted that more of the Presidential Hopefuls didn't participate in 10 Questions. Any one of them could have completed it in under an hour on the back of their tour buses, but so many are 100% absent that it makes me think they don't believe in the spread and influence of "the Internets." Even though I won't be voting for Huckabee, I'm impressed that he was the only GOP candidate to chime in. I certainly respect him for that. And what about candidates like Ron Paul who whine all day and all night about not being given the chance to participate in debates, but who is a total no-show here when the stage was his for the taking. Methinks he doth protest too much. (If he really had anything to say other than, "Let me debate!" he would have said it.) Hasn't Hillary prided herself on her outreach and honesty? (She does have to, after Bill's impeachment hearings…) Not a single response from her. This is no piddly little website, either. 10 Questions is in cahoots with the NY Times, MSNBC, and a host of other organizations spanning the entire political spectrum. I commend Edwards, Gravel, and Kucinich (… Who?) for at least sending in a response to every question. It could be argued that some of their responses skirt the question, but at least they responded. That's like getting some base points for spelling your name correctly on the SAT's. What drives me insane about this is that the overwhelming reason that candidates ignore or dance around issues is so that nobody will know for sure where they stand on the issue. All so that they can remain in the gray area and maybe get a few votes that they wouldn't if they admitted they were pro-whale-hunting, or whatever. I could just smack the whole lot of them. As far as I am personally concerned: I don't care what your viewpoint is, I just want you to pick one side or the other, and believe in it. Show some courage. Take chances. (Grow a pair!) I bet it would net you more votes than it cost you.

You may be asking yourself, if your self is part of my extended family, which we exchange ornaments instead of more expensive Christmas gifts, "Self: Why haven't I received a Christmas Card and Ornament from Adam and Megan?" Well, self erm, you. That, you can blame on the United States Postal Service. You see, they were mailed. Well before Christmas. We painstakingly hand signed and addressed every card and envelope (I know… itty bitty pity party… but when you know how to use a Mail Merge, why wouldn't you? (Answer: Wife won't let you.)) and stuffed the applicable ornaments into the applicable envelopes and applied a bevy of 41-cent stamps: one for each envelope. Then, instead of dropping them in a mailbox somewhere, Megan took them to the post office to ask a professional mail clerk (they go to school and get certified, right?) if any additional postage was necessary — which she was assured wasn't. They were mailed, and a couple of days later we received a bundle of them (though oddly, not all) in our mailbox wrapped neatly with a rubber band and each with an ugly sticker or hand-written note indicating that 17 cents additional postage was required presumably due to the extra quarter-inch of girth each held from being stuffed with an ornament. Disgusted with the lies of the professional postal clerk, Megan took them back to the post office, explained the situation to another professional mail clerk, and affixed an additional 10-cent, 5-cent, and 2-cent stamp to each before having the clerk send them off to their destinations. Again, days later, a couple of them came back because, presumably, the second professional mail clerk failed to clearly mark that the additional postage had indeed been paid, and (or possibly "or") someone saw the sticker/handwriting indicating that additional postage was needed but didn't check thoroughly enough for the "ok" written next to it, and decided that sending it back to us a second time would be cheaper than just sending it on its way. (Note to self regarding scheme to destroy the US Postal Service by way of drained budget: Send lots of letters with insufficient postage over and over again without affixing additional postage until, inevitably, they can no longer afford to buy gas to bring the letters back to me.) I knew we should have just elf'd ourselves and called it a day. Next year you're all just getting e-cards.