Being targeted by an uninspired small-town vandal was only the second most troubling thing that happened to Hillary Clinton on Tuesday. When U.S. News asked Johnny Rhoda, the Republican chairman for Arkansas’s second district, how Clinton would fare in her adopted home state if she decides to run in 2016, he answered, “She’d probably get shot at the state line,” adding, “Nobody has any affection for her. The majority don’t.”
A few hours later, he clarified the remark to Business Insider, claiming that it was taken out of context and off the record. (“Oh, yes, ‘taken out of context,’” quipped reporter David Catanese. “As in — taken out of our on-the-record conversation and into print.”) “It certainly was not meant in a threatening or hostile way at all. It was just a comment. Perhaps I used the wrong word,” Rhoda explained. “It was completely blown out of proportion.” People — and especially members of the Secret Service — do tend to get touchy when you mention shooting and public officials in the same sentence.
