Ted Nugent blasts Piers Morgan: Leave law-abiding gun owners alone

On Monday night, Ted Nugent blasted CNN's Piers Morgan, calling him "obsessed" and demanding he leave law-abiding gun owners "the h*ll alone."

Morgan began by asking Nugent why anyone would want an AR-15, a weapon that he had just fired shortly before the interview with Nugent.

“You don’t understand that it’s a simple inanimate tool that tens of millions of American families own that have never caused a problem, never had an accident and will never commit a crime,” Nugent said in response.

Morgan claimed that 100,000 people get hit by gunfire every year, but Nugent turned that argument back.

“Let me stop you there, because I’ve been hearing you say this and you’re so full of crap. Listen to me, that statistic includes bad guys shot by cops and intruders shot by homeowners. So that figure is bogus,” Nugent said.

According to the FBI, there were a total of 12,664 murders in 2011, 8583 of which were committed with firearms, less than one-tenth the number cited by Morgan.

Morgan said that 18,000 people commit suicide using a gun, causing Nugent to respond: “Japan has a higher suicide rate and they aren’t allowed to get downwind of a gun. Your turn.”

“Do you care about murders?” Nugent asked. “Or do you only care about about murders with guns?”

Morgan said he cares about all death.

“I don’t think you do. I think you care about guns. I think you’re obsessed with guns,” Nugent replied.

“99.99% of the gun owners of America are wonderful people that you are hanging around with here today. Perfectly safe. Perfectly harmless. Wonderful, loving, giving, generous caring people. Would you leave us the h*ll alone? Go after the nut jobs, go after the murderers, because I don’t know any. We need to lock up the bad guys and when people show dangerous, murderous intent, which everyone one of these mass murderers showed. All their neighbors, their family, their teachers, their fellow students, they all knew they were crazy but, Piers, we didn’t stop them because we’re worried about hurting their feelings. We have a mad man problem in America," Nugent said.

“I won’t leave you alone because this is a debate that needs to be had,” Morgan said.

Later, Morgan asked Nugent to respond to President Obama's gun proposals.

Nugent slammed Obama on a number of issues and said he was elected by a "clueless majority."

“I don’t agree with President Obama on any of this,” Nugent said, citing places with strict gun laws and skyrocketing crime, like Chicago.

Video of the exchange can be seen here.

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