I really do try to avoid writing about the far-right wing of the far-right wing of the Republican Party. First, there are simply too many names and too many ignorant maniacs saying way too many ignorantly maniacal things that it's nearly impossible to keep up. And many of them are just careerist trolls and former morning zoo deejays, jacking up their ratings/sales figures by popping off with anything and everything that will successfully keep their names in the news. Ann Coulter, Mike Savage, Glenn Beck, Laura Ingraham, Dennis Miller and rest of the usual suspects. These are the sorts of people who don't deserve our attention because they're not serious players.
That said, it's not a bad idea to occasionally gut check them anyway, just to let them know that they can't always get away with their poisonous disinformation and agitprop gibberish.
Ted Nugent is one of the far-right dingdongs who I occasionally revisit for this purpose. Not only is he an extremist conservative thug, but he's also one of those guys. We've all bumped into them in our day-to-day lives. He's of a familiar male personality type who fancies himself the ultimate badass -- a legend in his own mind, a narcissistic stuffed-shirt, a contrarian dickbag. They believe they're the only guys who have it all figured out. They have an acronym, zinger or a maxim for everything. They always know the best way to do everything, and they're not ashamed to condescend to anyone within earshot, especially when their company is actually more savvy and accomplished than they are. Yeah, I don't mind saying I viscerally hate these guys.
Plus, of course, Nugent is a gun fetishist. [continue reading]