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GLENN: Outrageous rocker, gun aficionado, hunter and all around good guy Ted Nugent. Welcome to the program, Ted. How are you?
NUGENT: Happy springtime, Glenn.
GLENN: Hey, I had to tell you I had somebody, it was a week ago tonight, somebody got onto the property here in my house, which is not really a good idea to do at, like, 2:00 in the morning.
NUGENT: Whoops.
GLENN: And they got onto the property of the house and, you know, there are signs posted all around the house, guard dog, weapons, just don't come in. And so they got on and they were doing some stuff just like a stupid idiot and I get up and I come down the house because I'm not sure if somebody's in the house now and, you know, I've got the big German Shepherd and I come down the house with the bandoliers across -- I mean, I had a shotgun and all of the --
NUGENT: Do you play bass guitar, Glenn? I'll hire you tomorrow.
GLENN: I mean, it was fantastic. I actually thought of you. I said, I either feel like Rambo or Ted Nugent. I'm not sure which, I'm not sure which. And you know what I was thinking was how stupid it is -- because it turns out, I think, that it was just some teenagers, how -- do you remember, Ted, when we were growing up, you know, you could go do stupid stuff. You can go TP somebody's house, et cetera, et cetera. I don't think you can do that anymore. You know, you have to know who the people are. You go do something stupid in somebody's yard or somebody's house in the middle of the night, you're liable to get yourself killed.
NUGENT: Well, yeah, there's a number of dynamics at play here. You're correct when we were young there was a lot of harmless maneuvering going on by the youth of America. We would visit people and we would soap windows and we would go up to people's houses and most of it was absolutely noncriminal. But today I think actually it might be a better situation today considering that we are in a war on terror and that, you know, vandalism and crime and American-on-American crime is one of the biggest heartbreakers in the world and I'd rather that a signal was sent out, don't tread on pee would be the rule of the day. If you want to come by the house, you want to have a good time, you might announce it and you might be our friends. If not, beware.
GLENN: Yeah, yeah. So let me just ask you this. Have you ever had anybody break into your house?
NUGENT: Yeah, we did actually. We had our barn broken into last year. Here's a little bit of irony for you. It was as I was about to speak at the NRA convention, someone breaking into my Michigan barn. But my good friends at the Michigan state police caught the rascals and they are currently in a cage where they belong.
GLENN: What happened?
NUGENT: My caretaker and my son were able to give some information along with the state police. Some punk, some meth-inspired punks, God, who would have thought that, broke in and stole some of our ATVs and some of our Kamp for Kids charity equipment. We have some sporting goods here that we store for our children's camp and they did get caught and they were lifelong criminals, a little of that recidivism reminder in play. And they did catch them and they put them away now. We've never been broken into while we were at home. In fact, if you would like to put the ultimate warning sign on your property, Glenn, you can have my permission to put "Ted Nugent lives here" on the sides of your property. I promise you security from hereon out.
GLENN: I bet. I bet. You're going out to take the Clark family, which is this amazing family. Have you spent much time talking to them yet?
NUGENT: Yes, I have. I've been communicating with Ruth and Lael, one of the sons, and with the Knowlton family out there in Texas at the Laguna Vista Ranch and just a beautiful place. Jed Knowlton and his family have a huge family, just loaded with wildlife and a wonderful lodge and we're setting stuff up for the kids' wheelchairs this fall, and I promise you, Glenn, and I do want to make sure you look at that invitation that I send you regularly because you've got to witness the sheer joy, the spirituality of a family in that primal setting where they get out in nature not as a spectator but as a participant and it's going to be a magic time and I'm honored to be a part of this.
GLENN: Well, here's the whole family in wheelchairs and they have muscular dystrophy and the boys just gave up hunting because they now go into the woods and take into the back of a truck but they don't have the strength anymore to squeeze the trigger.
NUGENT: I promise you they are going to have the time of their lives. We started CPR Kamp for Kids and along with Freedom's Angels, it's a military charity, we take a lot of kids that are limited to wheelchairs and worse and a lot of military heroes with no arms and no legs, no face but they got the spirit, they got the attitude. They certainly have the vision. And they get out there in a hunting blind, we got these double bull blinds that can be propped up any place and we're able to literally wheel our blood brothers out there and just throw a blind over them. They have the time of their life and it's very, very moving because this is really what they want. And here's a dynamic, Glenn. Not just the Clark family and people around the country but when a little boy, little girl contacts my office as they are facing imminent death in a terminal illness situation, they always want to go hunting. They want to get a hold of Uncle Ted and go hunting with Uncle Ted. These are little 6, 7, 8-year-old boys and girls who know they are not going to see next year and something inside them wants to go hunting. They can do a lot. A lot of them go to Disney World, a lot of them go to concerts but most of them want to go hunting. There's something very primal, very spiritual that even a young person understands, facing that enormous emotion of the end that drives them into the outdoors. We call it the spirit of the wild and it is powerful medicine.
GLENN: Do you know Sergeant Greg Stube?
NUGENT: Say that again?
GLENN: Do you know Sergeant Greg Stube?
NUGENT: I don't know the name, no.
GLENN: He is a guy, special forces 19 years, lost 70% of his intestines over in Afghanistan, an amazing man. First time I met him, I was at the NRA convention and he spoke, and I have to tell you, there was not a dry eye in the house and his wife is just as amazing as he is. But he told me, he said it was hunters that actually healed me. He said, every time I would hear a gun go off or an explosion or car backfire, he said, I freaked out. He said, going out hunting and having the positive reinforcement again of holding a gun in your hand and hearing that sound and being outside in the, you know, in the forest and, you know, one with the Earth, he said, it healed me.
NUGENT: Absolutely. And the definitiveness. There's an absolute surety to the hands-on conservation lifestyle of hunting, fishing and trapping where you know you're going to consume today. We're all going to consume today but it touches the soul to actually consume from the life. When you plant a tree and then get to heat from it years later, I promise you, Glenn, the heat's warmer. When you kill that deer by dedicating yourself to be the reasoning predator that we have all in our soul, when you kill that deer, it is a gift from God and it's a moving moment that you know you would never scrape leftovers into the trash because you had to go to the swamp early. You had to get that deer. You had to practice your heart and soul to being the best shot and the best marksman, the best archer, the best predator you can. And then you have to see that deer's eyes and you grasp it and you gut it and you skin it and you drag it back. It's sacred, Glenn.
GLENN: Hang on just a second. Hang on just a second. Hold on, Ted. Is there any reason that we don't have an affiliate in New York after this last break? Is there a single reason?
NUGENT: I promise you New York is loaded with hunters.
GLENN: Oh, yeah. No, I know. Ted, always great to talk to you, sir. We'll talk to you again.
NUGENT: God's speed, Glenn.
GLENN: Bye-bye.
