The saga began when a 26-year-old woman found a (still living) “gray and white cat with an arrow through it.” She contacted police and told them about a neighbor in her apartment complex who she said “has a history of shooting at animals with a bow and arrow from his back patio,” according to a press release from the Corpus Christi Police Department.
When officers talked to the 20-year-old [Kevin Shumake], according to the release, he “admitted to shooting the ‘wild cats’ in the complex.” Officers arrested him and found “bow and arrow equipment” in his apartment. They then called animal control officers to try to catch the injured cat, which “fled into a field. While searching for the cat, officers found a dead black and white cat named ‘Batman,’ with two arrows through it.”
The woman who called the cops, as well as her young daughter, “became very upset, as they considered ‘Batman’ their cat,” according to the release …
It is, of course, no surprise to read of such random cruelty perpetrated against pet animals.
What makes the story interesting, and you must clink the link to see the picture, is its coincidental connection to Ted Nugent. A photo included with the news piece shows Nugent with his bow and arrow kit, smiling, with the caption that even “the Nuge don’t bow-and-arrow no pussycats.”
This may have been true at one time. Or maybe not.
But, as readers know, the Nuge recently advocated shooting cats in a column for the Washington Times.
“[I] have instructed my family, friends, hunting buddies and casual passers-by to blast every feral cat they see,??? Nugent wrote for the newspaper.
As DD discussed, the problem with taking charge of controlling the feral cat population in such a manner inevitably leads to the shooting of someone’s beloved pet. Because, in the field, it is difficult to distinguish feral cats from pets.
Which is one of many reasons shooting cats is illegal in most places in the United States.
In any case, the Houston Press blog item on the random cat shooter nabbed by police generated an additional comment on Nugent, here.
America should launch the “Please Go Home” initiative for those 20 million or more illegals in America as soon as possible.
The “Please Go Home” initiative isn’t jingoistic or racist as the real vicious racists will proclaim. It is fundamental, logical immigration common sense.
The GOP will disagree with my proposed initiative because they believe that, to win future elections, they need to attract Mexican-Americans to the GOP. The GOP undoubtedly believes my initiative will further alienate Mexican-Americans. The Democrats will despise the initiative because they benefit politically from these folks.
It’s got to suck to be bought and paid for …
If the vast number of illegal Mexicans in America pack their bags and head back home, there will surely be an economic impact. Prices for food and other services will probably go up.
Prices for food and other services will probably go up. Savor that one. After all, Ted’s writing it from deep inna heart of Texas.
Like our Founding Fathers, I’m an extremist, and I wear my extremist label proudly. I buff it daily so that it shines extremely bright.
It’s Ted the parrot, another strike-out column repeating Tea Party orthodoxy he learnt just last year: Only Tea Party Americans understand the Constitution and the Founding Fathers.
Again, the second column isn’t worth your time. While Ted insists Thomas Jefferson would be branded a radical today, he never gets around to presenting anything that would make you think that ol’ TJ was quite the extremist like Ted.
For instance, there’s nothing obvious in the historical record to indicate TJ might have endorsed shooting cats within city limits.
And there’s nothing in Jefferson’s history to compare with Nugent’s non-speaking role as an outdoorsman sidekick who shoots various Mexicans with his bow and arrow in Toby Keith’s criminally unappreciated easy to fall asleep on the couch to Beer For My Horses.
One of the things established by the Ted Nugent tab is that the man is often completely without ideas. Not just big ones. Or even the occasional middling-sized one.
No, he’s so empty it’s often a challenge to write an even remotely interesting column.
When this happens, Ted flails.
So one week it’s endorsing shooting cats. Probably because he saw a few wandering through the bushes at Old Mean Spirit Wild ranch in Crawford. And that was really annoying.
Next, it was wishing himself happy birthday. Probably because he was fondly looking forward to his cake on the dining room table at Old Mean Spirit Wild ranch in Crawford.
After that, it was to call for the destruction of the Department of Energy. Probably because there was nothing happening at Old Mean Spirit Wild ranch in Crawford on the day the piece was due.
This week: An entire column saying almost nothing except the usual, tepidly. The government is needing destroying. Also, the Department of Energy. Kill it twice.
And who is the go-to guy we need to do this?
Newt Gingrich, sez Ted.
“He’s a forward-thinking, smart, idea guy,” writes Uncle Ted. Without giving one example of forward-thinking smart idea-ness.
I’d say go read it here. But it’s a grenade ya don’t need to jump on.
DD thought that ridiculing Ted (or at least his copy editor) out of the habit of run-on sentences would improve his composition. No such luck. It just took out some filler.
A bookend to yesterday’s “Varmint Hunter” piece on Ted Nugent advocating the shooting of feral cats.
Today, Nugent goes after the Dept. of Energy. He has a hate on for Steven Chu and wants the agency destroyed.
Nugent, who never pays attention to anything, makes the assumption that federal agencies never report to the US people what they’re doing.
While this is true for many things concerned with topics under the rubric of Secrecy Blog and WikiLeaks, it’s patently false when it comes to the material covered in Nugent’s column at the Washington Times.
Since Nugent doesn’t cover any news of the government he so despises and appears not to be Internet savvy, he has no idea of the wealth of information that is provided to everyone. Particularly on the economy, furnished by various federal and state agencies.
For example, the DOE could have told us that oil drilling in the Gulf has been banned for the next seven years, how many new windmills were built, how many Americans rode their bicycles to work, how many tankers full of foreign oil we imported this week and how much that imported oil cost America.
Let’s take a minute to address the last one. How much oil do we import and how much does it cost?
Wow, Ted. That took five seconds. And look! It’s furnished by the despised by the Dept. of Energy. US government agencies do, in fact, generally try to release information and statistics on matters under their purview to the American public in a reasonable and timely manner.
As for answering the question on how many people ride bicycles to work in the US, there is no way to exactly measure the answer. As most reasonable people with scientific minds might tell you.
However, none of this matters to Nugent. As it also does not matter to advocate for the haphazard shooting of feral cats, which would be illegal within city and town limits, where most people in the United States live.
Another bit of nosegold buried in Nugent’s current column is an indication that he doesn’t believe in global warming. And that, in particular, he doesn’t believe burning coal contributes to it.
It would come as no shock to me if Secretary of Green Energy Chu views the oil companies as villains, despises nuclear energy and believes burning coal causes global warming and is akin to genocide.
Obviously, it’s no secret that Ted Nugent is as stupid as he is mean. And while he is certainly a demon on guitar, he’s one of the laziest writers under the sun who ever got paid for it.
In related news, sales of Sarah Palin’s book — “America by Heart” — have slowed.
Apparently for making a thirty second TV public service announcement through the aegis of Texas A&M’s forest service university system. That video is here.
Other celebrities who made such videos for Texas include Jake Kellen, George Bush the Elder, and Willie Nelson.
The 2010 call for nominations for the award, run by the US government — which Nugent hates, is here.
Readers of this blog know Ted Nugent is a man stunningly bereft of ideas and human warmth.
As evidence one only has to read his columns.
Page after page on the Mao Tse-Tung fan club in the Whitehouse. And how subprime mortgages to people of color and entitlements to the same blew up the world economy, not Wall Street.
In the book Griftopia, Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi devotes quite a bit to describing them as confused white nincompoops, easily misled by wealthy crooks. And they, like Ted Nugent, really do believe the economy went to shit and left friends and family without jobs because black people got houses they didn’t deserve.
If you believe in God, then he certainly has a sense of humor.
Right next to Griftopia at Vroman’s in Pasadena — Michael Savage’s Trickle Up Poverty, a book that purports to tell how people who aren’t white blew up the economy and are making us all poor.
Rather surprisingly, Nugent hasn’t yet piped up on the granting of the tax cuts to the wealthy through holding the unemployed hostage. You would think it would have been a natural for him, something to cackle over between assertions that jobless people are bloodsuckers and that all taxes need elimination.
“[I] have instructed my family, friends, hunting buddies and casual passers-by to blast every feral cat they see,” Nugent writes, referring to open season on cats at his Crawford ranch.
Since there were no Democratic targets to insult or hate on for this subject, Nugent singled out a rather reasonable scientific paper issued by the University of Nebraska entitled “Feral Cats and Their Management.”
The population of feral cats in America is 60 million, notes the paper. It’s a staggering number that defies all methods aimed at reducing it.
The purpose of the paper is to describe the effectiveness of various methods of controlling feral cat populations, which are very damaging because of their impact on songbirds.
The authors realize the sensitivity of the subject in cat-friendly America and bend over backwards to avoid giving even the slightest impression of cruelty toward animals as a recommendation.
Nugent, naturally, won’t have it.
“Let us hope the University of Nebraska didn’t spend more than 10 bucks on this research,” he sneers.
The Nebraska authors conclude that “shooting is an efficient method” and that trapping, neutering, vaccinating and releasing of feral cats in established colonies is a great deal of work. And that eliminating colonies in this manner can take years.
They also write of other factors which would be of no concern to Ted Nugent. Like the fact that if you indiscriminately shoot all cats on your property, you will inevitably wind up killing someone’s beloved pet.
“[Determining] which cats are feral and which are someone’s pet may be difficult,” conclude the Nebraska researchers. “Owners must be responsible by keeping their cats on their property …”
“Shooting in urban areas is a very sensitive matter …” they advise in a paragraph informing that gunning for cats is not only potentially unsafe to others within built up populated areas but also illegal in Omaha and Lincoln — and probably, by extension, within the boundaries of most towns and cities.
Nugent’s column is also, naturally, PETA bait. Nugent hates PETA with a passion and recently implied that it was such animal lovers who were responsible for getting him into trouble with the hunting authorities in California.
And a representative of PETA wrote a letter to the editor at the Washington Times as a consequence of Nugent’s piece.
Jump on the grenade. Nugent pitches for Sarah Palin’s Alaska.
Good news, lads! Good news! I just learned Ted is up for the role of Howard in a remake of The Treasure of Sierra Madre!
The image of vigor diluted by white fluff on chin and old man dental noise.
The man really needs to figure out how to minimize the teeth whistling sibilants. It’s possible Nugent doesn’t notice it the the way others do since his hearing loss has been well documented. Or maybe he just doesn’t care.
“[The] … median age of [Sarah Palin’s Alaska] show is 57 — that’s 15 years older than TLC’s average,” reads a piece at the Hollywood Reporter.
Astonishingly, today’s e-mail brought a despicable missive from barackobama.com’s honcho, Mitch Stewart. It was a blandishment to astro-turf for the rightness of freezing the pay of middle class federal government workers.
Here:
Will you take a few minutes and write a letter to the editor today to set the record straight?
Using our letter-to-the-editor tool is easy, and we’ll provide tips and talking points to get you started.
Yesterday’s announcement is simply the latest in a series of steps taken by this administration to cut costs and stretch federal dollars.
On his first day in office, President Obama froze the salaries of all senior White House officials — a freeze he later extended to other political appointees. And, in his 2011 budget, he put forward more than $1 trillion in deficit reduction, including a three-year freeze in non-security, discretionary spending.
But if we’re going to tackle the deficit and continue to keep the economy moving in the right direction, we’re far from finished.
As the President said, yesterday’s announcement is not a decision he made lightly. He knows firsthand that the people affected by this pay freeze work hard and sacrifice out of love for their country and in the name of serving their fellow Americans. They are doctors and nurses who care for our veterans. They are scientists researching better treatments and cures for disease.
But if we’re serious about cutting costs, it will require a shared sacrifice from all Americans. It is going to require both sides of the aisle working together. And it is going to require an open, honest debate — one in which partisan politics takes a back seat to the task at hand.
So the next time a friend or family member repeats the untruths about “reckless spending and big government,” tell them the truth about the President’s fiscal leadership and his decision to freeze federal pay for two years.
You can start helping get out the facts by writing a letter to the editor of your local paper today …
It’s eye-watering in its pure evil. Write a letter to your editor saying what a swell guy the prez is for freezing pay to average Joe’s while Wall Street and corporate America enjoy the best year, ever.
The organization formerly known as Obama for America is asking supporters to write letters in support of a federal pay freeze.
“Obama Runs Play from the GOP Book” read the headline on the frontpage of today’s LA Times.
Could have added as subhed: “Adopts policy of sworn enemies, gets kicked in teeth, anyway. Loses even more supporters.”
If there’s a website that’s asked for a DDoS attack today, it’s barackobama.com
Ted Nugent, before Thanksgiving, from the Detroit News:
Far more belt-tightening is in order. We need to make the belt-tightening painful if we are going to climb out of this deep financial hole and save America …
Fedzilla must be put on a strict diet. With the exception of the Defense Department, all federal departments, agencies and organizations should receive 6 1/2 percent less in their budgets for the next four years …
The real Ted Nugent showed his usual colors just before entering the Thanksgiving weekend.
In the Detroit News, his usual totally-lacking-in-any-semblance-of-human-charity thing, an opinion piece full of irritation over ‘entitlements,’ having to pay taxes, and anything for future old people (not him):
We need to make the belt-tightening painful if we are going to climb out of this deep financial hole and save America.
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Roughly 50 percent of all Medicare costs are spent in a person’s last six months of life. When a person is terminally ill or without hope of getting better, forcing taxpayers to keep them alive isn’t fair. If the terminally ill individual or his family wants to keep him alive for as long as possible, then they should pay for it, not taxpayers … Last time I checked, churches have a few billion dollars worth of gold, silver, jewelry, art, real estate and other assets. Maybe they could use some of it for such compassionate causes. Maybe not.
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We should put Social Security on a path to extinction. How about this: Anyone over 45 will receive Social Security. Anyone under 45 will not receive it, but they will be forced to continue paying into Social Security to pay for those over 45.
Suggesting churches give up what he implies is loot in gold and silver is an unusually new and surprising low, even for someone like Ted Nugent.
When I started the Ted Nugent tab months ago I wondered what had shriveled him so much.
Here was a guy who had everything in the Seventies (and for a chunk of the Eighties). And as his career declined he folded like cardboard. Unable to reinvent himself gracefully in old age, he turned into a mouthpiece for the extreme right’s most vicious social policies, nothing more than a convenient gasbag for the Washington Times, or someone good for three minutes on Fox News.
Nugent fled Michigan for Crawford, Texas, starting a column for the Waco Tribune, where he was also run off for being uncharitable and rude.
Those who have read the entries on Nugent in this blog have seen the man in his words, ranting on obscure Internet radio programs and television shows. There he is, the strict law-and-order dude and mighty hunter, complaining bitterly and vituperatively over trivial troubles that were entirely his own doing in California. Opining that he’s been victimized by various conspiracies.
What motivates Ted Nugent is vindictiveness. And it is why he so identifies with the Tea Party.
Over the weekend, Paul Krugman pointed to an essay on the failure of US economic policy-making written by economist Brad DeLong. It is here.
Near the end, the author invokes “Nitzschean Ressentiment” to explain a common prevailing attitude.
It translates to ‘because (I or we) have suffered, it is appropriate and good that even more suffer.’
“Nietzsche talked about the losers, or about those who thought they were losers,” DeLong writes. “He discussed their tendencies in various ways to transvalue their values — to say what was thought to be bad was in fact good because it was thought to be bad.”
That’s Ted Nugent in a nutshell. He never recovered from losing his place at the top of the heap, a process all rock stars must inevitably go through. Many handle it with struggle and embarrassment. Others deal with it quietly and gracefully. A few die from it.
However, Ted Nugent decided he’d take it out on the values of the people who put him in the arenas during the high tide of classic rock. And he lost even more, gaining only a reputation as a panderer for people with fortunes which make his place in life look very small.
Krugman appropriately shits on the president for pandering — this morning.
“They did a witch-hunt and a during a Gestapo, jack-booted thug raid based on the allegation that my forked horn buck was a spike as spurred on by phone calls from the ‘Ted Haters.'”
California game wardens are “infested” — infiltrated — by interests from animal rights’ groups, Nugent added.
In the blog post, Nugent said he took one for his buddy when pleading to the charges.
Although the report is garbled, it apparently has something to do with a Nugent colleague being found in possession of brass knuckles, Ted intimating he took the fall to make the more serious charge go away.
In California, brass knuckles are outlawed. Possession is a felony.
The legalities are discussed here in a news report relating what happened when Electronic Arts sent out brass knuckles, which were hurriedly recalled, as part of a Godfather game promotion:
In the United States alone, brass knuckles are illegal in at least ten states: Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, Oregon, Utah, and Washington.
Ted, however, vowed revenge:
“There was a witch-hunt for Ted Nugent, but they’re going to lose. I’m going to get them.”
Rocker Ted Nugent won’t be hunting in Kansas this fall, said Kevin Jones, Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks law enforcement chief. Nugent has bowhunted in Kansas several years and has an archery deer permit for the current season … Jones said Kansas’ electronic license system will not permit Nugent to purchase a hunting license online or over-the-counter.
And there is Nugent’s election-eve column in the Washington Times, a very poor man’s Ayn Rand — here.
Harmonization of hunting laws in various states means suspension of a license in one leads to automatic suspension in another. And earlier in the week this led game wardens in California and South Dakota to look into whether Ted Nugent had hunted pheasant prior to a Tea Party rally in South Dakota illegally.
Nugent’s license to hunt deer has been temporarily suspended in California over two misdemeanor convictions stemming from deer-baiting.
However, the suspension only covers deer hunting. And in California, that leaves Nugent free to hunt everything else but deer until the suspension is over. Which would seem to quite fairly get him off the hook in South Dakota.
Department officials won’t confirm the investigation or discuss
details, but a California wildlife officer provided some information on the case Thursday, confirming that Nugent did lose some hunting privileges in California for deer-hunting violations.
But the suspension only covers deer hunting. The rocker and widely
known gun advocate can still hunt pheasants and other game in
California, said Patrick Foy, a warden and public information
officer for the law enforcement division of the California Fish and
Game Department.
“Ted Nugent is prohibited from hunting deer in California until after June 30 of 2012,” Foy said. “He can hunt pheasants. He can hunt pigs. He can hunt whatever else he wants to hunt. He is prohibited from hunting deer.”
The article goes on to state California wardens consider Nugent cooperative and remorseful over his offense.
However, they have probably not seen Nugent railing over his convictions on YouTube video — like readers at this blog have — calling game law “indecent” and anti-freedom.
One curious thing in the run-up to election day re Nugent.
While he is out stumping for various Tea Party candidates, he has yet to repeat a WaTimes column calling for varmint hunting with no bag limit on Tuesday. As he repeatedly did earlier in the year.
While there are a couple of days left for him to revert, Nugent has not gone back to euphemistically calling for violence — varmint hunting and crowbar swinging — on election day.
Paradoxically, what readers have seen — if they’re in America — is that through the summer and into the fall, the weakness of leadership in the President and Democratic Party and the very bad economy, have allowed for the complete mainstreaming of Ted Nugent-style extremism.
And that on certain occasions, actually beating up people, as long as they are Democrats, is OK.