Arpaio Visits Houston and the Bigots at Westboro Baptist Church Have a New Target: Jews

"[Marriage's] not happening, dude," she told me, laughing. "The Lord is coming."

Sara didn't know much about Tempe's Obama-death-wish preacher Steven Anderson, so I told her that he believed the president was deserving of death for his abortion stance, as were gays, adulterers, and then some. Sara concurred, in general, but she seemed to part ways when it came to praying for Obama to die, as Anderson says he does.

Liana Lopez

The 2009 Bull Connor Award, presented to Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Houston by activist Liliana Castrillón.

Stephen Lemons

Sara Phelps, granddaughter of Westboro Baptist Church pastor Fred Phelps, protests "the Jews" outside Tempe's Temple Emanuel on September 4.

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"Obama is the Antichrist," she said, sounding a lot like one of those crackpot Tea Party types. "He is going to lead this nation to its destruction. This government is already too far gone . . . What I want to happen to him is exactly what the Lord has willed. So we wait patiently on our God to deliver his righteous judgments."

After Sara and her family members skedaddled, I ambled over to the sane side of the street. I spoke briefly with Sally Oscherwitz, president of Temple Emanuel's board of trustees. She told me that though she knew the WBC members were traditionally nonviolent, they still like to instigate violence by inflaming counter-protesters.

"We're an inclusive community," she explained. "We're diverse. We have wonderful, beautiful relationships with mosques and other churches and synagogues in the Valley. And what [the WBC does] is foreign to us. It's not what we're about."

Others present worried about me covering the demonstration, about giving ink to the WBC, which is notoriously media-hungry. I considered not writing up the group's visit, but then I saw Channel 3's footage of Captain Jenkins' funeral the next day, in which the reporter showed one quick shot of Sara Phelps, saying that "protesters lined the streets" without explaining there were only a few, and that they were emissaries from this deranged Kansas pastor, not anti-war lefties.

I reckoned it was better for people to know what these WBC idiots are actually about.