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Petition: Draft Ted Nugent to Serve in Afghanistan

Posted: 02/12/2013 9:51 am

Ted Nugent is perhaps the most courageous man in America. America needs courageous men. Hence, I've launched a petition to draft Ted Nugent to serve on the front lines in Afghanistan.

You may well wonder why Mr. Nugent has not already made this decision on his own. This is a complex medical affair: while courageous in a way rarely encountered this side of Chuck Norris, Mr. Nugent has long been plagued by an allergy to active duty. I stress that this is an allergy, not a personal disposition. There is a vast difference, yo.

Ted Nugent wants to fight. He just can't bring himself to do so, because of this unfortunate and rare ailment. We can help.

When called up to serve in Vietnam, Ted Nugent allegedly contracted a serious bowel condition. We have this allegation from an impeccable source: Ted Nugent. In an article in High Times magazine in 1977, Mr. Nugent described this rare and unpleasant intestinal failure in gruesome detail. When he finally presented himself for duty, he was a walking disease of a human being, and the army wouldn't touch him: "They'd call dead people before they'd call my ass."

Note that this in no way reflects upon Mr. Nugent's courage or capabilities. It is also, as "The Nuge" himself points out, something of an irony:

But you know the funny thing about it? I'd make an incredible army man. I'd be a colonel before you knew what hit you, and I'd have the baddest bunch of motherf*uckin' killers you'd ever seen in my platoon. But I just wasn't into it. I was too busy doin' my own thing, you know?

We do know. And now that your own thing involves rocking heavily on behalf of guns and the constitutional right to high-capacity magazines, you should have the opportunity to do it, right? Your own thing.

We can help.

Now, Mr. Nugent later denied the words above -- and, let's face it, they don't really sound like the decorous rhetoric we associate with the real Ted Nugent -- so we'll have to lean here on snopes.com: his deferment was of an educational sort (twice), before he was rejected "as a result of a physical examination." And that physical might have determined, for all we know, that The Nuge had a debilitating hangnail.

Still, the lingering suspicion dogs Mr. Nugent, and it's our collective duty to make this clear: that dog won't hunt. Hence, the "Draft Ted Nugent" campaign.

Historically, the draft has been a complex issue, to put it mildly. In 1918, the Supreme Court deemed it constitutional for Congress to mandate conscription: Congress gets to declare the war, so it gets to decide who's going to do the warring.

Twice, however, the president himself has shown personal muscle in this regard. The draft was altered by executive order in 1942, and again in 1953. Ladies and gentleman, we have a precedent. What decent, reasonable SCOTUS would sniff at an executive order this selective, exceptional, and patriotic? Hence, to bypass deadlock in Congress, we are presenting our petition directly to the White House.

Mr. President, draft the Nuge. Let them know what the Great American Satan looks like turned up to eleven.

Imagine you're a shy, cave-dwelling Talibanista, and you're confronted by a yowling Motor City staple of classic rock radio stations, shouldering a bazooka and clutching the Second Amendment and making that face that you see on the cover of Cat Scratch Fever.

(How do you say "gosh, that's quite something" in Pashto?)

President Obama, you owe it to the United States of America to draft this hunk o' has-been rockstar. Let the Nuge serve proudly and loudly on the front lines, before the war ends and he is forever denied this headlining gig.

Moreover, it is time to clear the Nugent name. As the Ted Nugent Draft is shouted from the mountaintops, let there also be proclaimed a bitchin' presidential pardon, forgiving Mr. Nugent for whatever caused him regretfully to decline active duty during the Vietnam War.

You're good to go, Ted. No cowardice in your past, and none in your future.

And when the last of the troops comes home, Colonel, we'll leave you to Wango Tango in Tora Bora, armed to the canines, and you can personally scour the caves for left-over bad guys: solo like Rambo. You'll have all the big-bored gun tech you could possibly dream of. There ain't no ban in the 'Stan -- you won't be prosthetically neutered by chickenshit small-capacity liberals. This will be the unfettered Nuge, a one-man death-dealin', cat-scratchin' war machine: the guy immortalized by Guitar World magazine for playing #7 in the "100 Worst Guitar Solos" of all time. Surely it's time to add to that honor a posthumous purple heart.

NOTE: The original petition on the US government site has been removed. We can argue about whether or not this constitutes censorship, but more important is to sign the new version of the petition, which I have launched on change.org:

Please sign here.

The petition reads: "Ted Nugent, draft dodger, should have the opportunity to redeem his sullied reputation, so that he can drown us in a cesspool of guns. In fact, we should make him do this. An executive order is appropriate: Mr. President, conscript the Nuge."

 
 
 

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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
bubwalt
another day in my life
10:37 AM on 02/25/2013
Ted is no different than the draft dodgers who became political military supporters later in their lives. People like Dick Cheney, Bill Clinton and so forth.
10:33 PM on 02/17/2013
I get what the author is saying but we don't need to send ANYONE else over to Afghanistan to fight the corporate/government-sponsored, illegal confiscation of Afghan natural resources.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
ms velma
Question everything
11:36 PM on 02/13/2013
So Ted would make a kick a$# soldier? Too bad he didn't prove it when he had the chance. But he was doing his thing then, which I guess means he was making lousy music and banging underage girls. Where is this petition? I will sign it!
06:15 PM on 02/13/2013
This was fun to read. How does someone like this Nugent fellow become famous? Only in America.
04:55 PM on 02/13/2013
Ted in our service? In considering his behavior, He lacks the gear. To trust him with the lives of other services man would too much to risk.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
ms velma
Question everything
11:39 PM on 02/13/2013
Just have the army stock up on it's supply of Depends. He'll be fine and he'd scare the he!! out of the Taliban.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
MeatShield
01:02 AM on 02/15/2013
Skip the Depends and we could use him as a chemical weapon.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Scott Stevenson
Whatever Mary
02:31 PM on 02/13/2013
Signed and shared it in my FB page.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Emy Freeland
And... there.
02:15 PM on 02/13/2013
My Dad's number was called up for the draft during the vietnam war, but he had suffered a hernia in his early teens and couldn't lift the rifle. Plus I don't think he would have survived the mental trauma that Veterans talk about to this day... He was diagnosed as dysthymic and medicated, so I have no idea if that was a factor in being rejected as well or if the boards were that highly selective. Just grateful that he had the hernia....I'm not sure I would be here if he had been put through a tour of duty.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
ms velma
Question everything
11:44 PM on 02/13/2013
At least your dad didn't crap his pants to get out of serving.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Emy Freeland
And... there.
12:31 AM on 02/14/2013
True... I've only heard bits of the story over the years, and the few times he's talked about it. As for Nugent:  I can't even fathom how you get your body to a point that you can eliminate to such a degree that it scares a group of soldiers... and by that same token by doing this parlor trick what kind of crookedness have you done to your digestive system to do this stand up act? I guess getting sepsis or perforating a bowel never crossed his mind as a possibility... 
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11:09 AM on 02/13/2013
The author's tongue in cheek premise of the article: what other people need to do to make my world better. Just like a liberal to draft other people's property and lives in pursuit of their own cause.
HUFFPOST SUPER USER
ms velma
Question everything
11:50 PM on 02/13/2013
Not so. Nugent has been a very vocal proponent of our 2nd Amendment rights. The author is merely proposing that Ted put his money where his mouth always is and go out and defend those rights himself. Ted would love it. He'd get to shoot his guns at anythng that moves and he'd be a hero instead of some crazy old guy. And as long as the army keeps a supply of Depends for him, he'd be fine.
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03:03 AM on 02/15/2013
I don't think that Ted is used to the deer shooting back.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
LASkeans
08:14 AM on 02/13/2013
My husband (Airborne Ranger, Nam era) was called back to active duty, when he was in his late 40's, immediately after 9/11 so why not? Let Ted see what REAL fighters have to do (follow orders of a commanding officer). Doubt he'd think it was so "bad ass"
07:50 AM on 02/13/2013
Ahaha! I was delighted to sign. Good one, Mr. Cooper!
06:27 AM on 02/13/2013
Nute would be great on a ticket together with Sarah.
01:17 AM on 02/14/2013
Yeah, a one way ticket to Afghanistan for them both.
04:38 AM on 02/13/2013
If we're going to rely on him to defend us in Afghanistan, will someone please make sure to send him over there AFTER the war is officially over? While you're at it, can we just fence all of the combatants? I bet if we tricked them into showing up at a dinner hall or something, Nugent could easily target everyone the US Military wants to get rid of with perfect accuracy... provided he's got a good enough scope.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Ferdinand Berkhof
ratio & respect
03:14 AM on 02/13/2013
I like...
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Poetsxcape511
03:07 AM on 02/13/2013
Ted Nuget shouldn't be the only one. There are several people in our government should probably go too.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
ZeraLee
A Citizen's View from Main Street
02:02 AM on 02/13/2013
Be careful what you wish for. I don't think I want Mr. Nugent defending *my* country. He seems to be a bit unreliable, to say the least.