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Gun-toting rock wife aims for Kerry
From The Sunday Times
May 17, 2004
IF you go down to the woods today, make sure you are wearing a bright orange safety vest and hope that Shemane Nugent is not hiding behind a bush with a .38 tucked in her belt and a steel-tipped arrow loaded in her hunting bow.
The blonde huntress, who is the wife of rock star Ted Nugent and mother to son Rocco, stormed into Washington last week to introduce the capital's urban elite to a growing political phenomenon: gals who like guns.
The ladylike decorum of a Conservative Women's Network luncheon was shattered by a rabble-rousing speech from the co-author of Kill It & Grill It, a guide to arguably the simplest diet ever published in the US. "Kill stuff, add fire and enjoy," Nugent urged her audience.
Nugent made it clear that Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, who some right-wingers consider soft on gun owners' rights, was in her sights.
"Someone better tell Kerry that when a mother bear is defending her young she is unstoppable," she said.
Nugent's presence in a conference hall at the Heritage Foundation -- one of Washington's best-known conservative think tanks -- reflected her intriguing transition from the wronged wife of a wayward rock star into a right-wing political icon.
Married for 15 years to Ted Nugent, a rock 'n' roll guitarist formerly known as the Motor City Madman, she is rapidly turning herself into the celebrity face of the estimated 17 million American women who own guns.
In her first book, Married to a Rock Star, Nugent, 41, described in agonising terms the moment when her husband knelt down before her and admitted to "a terrible mistake" involving another woman.
Fortunately, Nugent managed not to shoot her husband and forgave him instead. The couple collaborated on Kill It & Grill It, which includes recipes for sweet and sour antelope, wild boar chops and squirrel stew.
In the book, Ted, 55, describes himself as a "hard-drivin', hard-lovin', full-throbbin', high-octane, deer-slayin', all-things-scarin', ballistic guitar boy".
Somehow this improbable couple rub shoulders with the US's conservative elite. Ted Nugent, whose best-known hit was Cat Scratch Fever in 1977, prides himself on both his marksmanship and his works for conservative charities. He recently declared: "I almost feel like Mother Teresa with a Glock (pistol)". President George W. Bush once told him: "You're a good man."
In an apparent attempt to replace Ozzy Osbourne and his family as the US's oddest rock'n'roll clan, the Nugents have launched a new reality series, Surviving Nugent. The series dumped a dozen contestants on the Nugents' Texas ranch (not far from the Bush spread in Crawford), where they competed in wilderness pursuits such as taxidermy and tossing buffalo manure.
In the first episode, Ted was taken to hospital for 40 stitches after he sliced his leg with a chainsaw while showing contestants how to cut wood. Despite this promising start, the reviews were unkind; one critic dubbed the series "plain awful".
Gun-toting rock wife aims for Kerry
From The Sunday Times
May 17, 2004
IF you go down to the woods today, make sure you are wearing a bright orange safety vest and hope that Shemane Nugent is not hiding behind a bush with a .38 tucked in her belt and a steel-tipped arrow loaded in her hunting bow.
The blonde huntress, who is the wife of rock star Ted Nugent and mother to son Rocco, stormed into Washington last week to introduce the capital's urban elite to a growing political phenomenon: gals who like guns.
The ladylike decorum of a Conservative Women's Network luncheon was shattered by a rabble-rousing speech from the co-author of Kill It & Grill It, a guide to arguably the simplest diet ever published in the US. "Kill stuff, add fire and enjoy," Nugent urged her audience.
Nugent made it clear that Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, who some right-wingers consider soft on gun owners' rights, was in her sights.
"Someone better tell Kerry that when a mother bear is defending her young she is unstoppable," she said.
Nugent's presence in a conference hall at the Heritage Foundation -- one of Washington's best-known conservative think tanks -- reflected her intriguing transition from the wronged wife of a wayward rock star into a right-wing political icon.
Married for 15 years to Ted Nugent, a rock 'n' roll guitarist formerly known as the Motor City Madman, she is rapidly turning herself into the celebrity face of the estimated 17 million American women who own guns.
In her first book, Married to a Rock Star, Nugent, 41, described in agonising terms the moment when her husband knelt down before her and admitted to "a terrible mistake" involving another woman.
Fortunately, Nugent managed not to shoot her husband and forgave him instead. The couple collaborated on Kill It & Grill It, which includes recipes for sweet and sour antelope, wild boar chops and squirrel stew.
In the book, Ted, 55, describes himself as a "hard-drivin', hard-lovin', full-throbbin', high-octane, deer-slayin', all-things-scarin', ballistic guitar boy".
Somehow this improbable couple rub shoulders with the US's conservative elite. Ted Nugent, whose best-known hit was Cat Scratch Fever in 1977, prides himself on both his marksmanship and his works for conservative charities. He recently declared: "I almost feel like Mother Teresa with a Glock (pistol)". President George W. Bush once told him: "You're a good man."
In an apparent attempt to replace Ozzy Osbourne and his family as the US's oddest rock'n'roll clan, the Nugents have launched a new reality series, Surviving Nugent. The series dumped a dozen contestants on the Nugents' Texas ranch (not far from the Bush spread in Crawford), where they competed in wilderness pursuits such as taxidermy and tossing buffalo manure.
In the first episode, Ted was taken to hospital for 40 stitches after he sliced his leg with a chainsaw while showing contestants how to cut wood. Despite this promising start, the reviews were unkind; one critic dubbed the series "plain awful".
