They are for getting themselves in the media spotlight. No more, no less.

Can there be anyone left in that congregation who was simply looking for a church community?

Amy,

that is an extremely funny foundation for a Daily Show skit. Can you imagine someone looking for a church community, finds them by accident, and horror and hijinks ensue.

If there was ever a group that deserved a chain-link-fence Freedom Zone a couple blocks from an event, it's the Westboro so-called Church.

Can there be anyone left in that congregation who was simply looking for a church community?

It's my understanding that there basically isn't a congregation - its pretty much just the Phelps family and their lawsuits using the name "church" to look more like an actual respectable organization.

If the campus police are sworn officers, they are real police, just working for a university rather than a city. I'd guess that a 911 call from campus would be routed to the campus police

This. I know at the U. of Alabama, the campus police are actually state troopers assigned to the university. The U is considered a state institution, so they get state troopers.

From a blog at The Atlantic:

If there is anything more pathetic than a presidential candidate who can't name the government departments he previously said he would eliminate, it is a group of college students rioting because a football coach they admired was fired for his indifference to allegations of child abuse leveled against one his assistants.

Here's a quote from one of the rioters: "We got rowdy, and we got maced," Jeff Heim, 19, said rubbing his red, teary eyes. "But make no mistake, the board started this riot by firing our coach. They tarnished a legend."

I am not one of those who argue that this country is in some sort of decline, but Mr. Heim does not symbolize an ascendant America.

I really hope McQueary is not coaching on Saturday, but it looks like the plan is that he will be.

Are you kidding? Does Penn State have enough security for him? I'm serious.

Author John Scalzi has an incredibly good post up reflecting on Penn State in the light of LeGuin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas". You don't necessarily have to have read the story first. [link]

It's my understanding that there basically isn't a congregation - its pretty much just the Phelps family and their lawsuits using the name "church" to look more like an actual respectable organization.

Yeah, I think I read that it used to be an actual church, but practically everyone other than his family left in the seventies when he started publicly denouncing the sins of all the other congregants.

I think Paterno was being incredibly naive in thinking that he could coach the rest of the season, just for that reason. It wouldn't be about football at all, but a constant media circus.