Republican Joe Kaufman loves the Second Amendment, and if he wants to look in the mirror and play with his gun, daggummit, that's his right. He exercised that right last November -- and shot himself in the finger, according to Gossip Extra.
"Don't go thinking I tried to commit suicide," he told the website. "I didn't know there was a bullet in the chamber. I was careless. It became a teaching moment for me, but it won't stop me from supporting the right to bear arms."
The bullet, after its encounter with Kaufman's finger, went through the bathroom wall and got stuck in a bedroom wall. He wasn't charged with anything.
He added that "I use my guns for protection" and sometimes wears a bulletproof vest to public appearances.
Nobody should go and shoot the guy -- he does a good job of that himself -- but Kaufman has good reason to suspect people don't really like him: His anti-Muslim group, Americans Against Hate, was wholly lampooned by the Daily Show in January in a segment that featured Kaufman unable to define the word against.
He's made a political career based exclusively on persecuting Muslims -- a Florida chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State even gave him an award for "his consistent record of trashing everything Muslim with a broad brush of innuendo, association and excessive rhetoric." He also criticized the Broward Sheriff's Office for having the nerve to meet with South Florida Muslim leaders because "organizations connected to terrorism and bigotry should have no place in law enforcement and no place in society, as they are a danger to society." There's also that narrative being pushed by Kaufman and Tea Party leaders that he's just more Jewish than Wasserman Schultz.
In summary: Kaufman runs around yelling that entire demographics have "no place in society," then feels threatened enough to wear bulletproof vests and buy guns. At least he's practicing?
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