[Matt Wiser]

Incidentally, there was a documentary shot by a University of Kansas film student that aired on Showtime last week; the young man filmed the Phelps cult as they went about their business, and he managed to find out why they act the way they do: Fred Phelps was a lawyer who was disbarred in the early '80s, and then began his virulent brand of preaching. As for why they picket soldiers' funerals (and others as well)? Simple: it's extreme narcissism (an inability to feel the pain and sorrow of others). The Phelps cult had a pipe bomb tossed onto their church in 1995, and the perps only got a slap on the wrist. And since IEDs started out as oversized pipe bombs initally, these lunatics put two and two together, and that's when everything broke loose. They seem to relish the fact that they are probably the most despised protest group in the U.S. today.

[Dilligafst]

Would hardly surprise me. The thing that is always surprising about cults is that they always manage to get someone to follow them.