By Pat Wray
I’m a hunter, and I know that hunters need a spokesperson. We need someone with a lifetime of experience who speaks with authority about preserving public lands and the wild animals living there that we love to hunt. We need someone whose personal magnetism generates interest simply by speaking on the subject of hunting.
I just don’t want my spokesman to be Ted Nugent.
It doesn’t bother me much that the former rock musician is abrasive and obnoxious. If being obnoxious were illegal, several of my friends would be imprisoned.
It doesn’t bother me that Nugent receives media attention far out of proportion to his actual importance. He sold 30 million albums, so has earned his time in the public eye far more honestly than Paris Hilton or Kim Kardashian.
It doesn’t bother me that Nugent dresses in American flag-themed clothing and styles himself an American patriot even though as a young man he worked very hard to avoid the draft and the Vietnam War. Our country seems to be full of people just like him … late-in-life self-righteous types who are more willing to risk their sons and daughters in combat than they were to go themselves.
It doesn’t even bother me that Nugent has somehow become a standard-bearer for a significant number of American gun owners and hunters. More....