NC: Second Amendment Supporters Will Be Better Off With Cawthorn Loss

North Carolina – -(AmmoLand.com)- Second Amendment supporters should not buy the spin that will come from some about the defeat of Madison Cawthorn in the primary for the 11th Congressional District in North Carolina. His loss wasn’t because of a plot. Sure, some establishment types were trying to beat him, but much of his somewhat surprising primary loss was due to his own mistakes, particularly his irresponsibility in exercising his Second Amendment rights.

Yeah, you read that right: Madison Cawthorn was irresponsible with his firearms on those two occasions involving carry-on luggage at airports. Loyal AmmoLand News readers should agree that is carelessness at best. True, Cawthorn didn’t have a negligent discharge like Bob Barr, shoot someone in the face like Dick Cheney, or replicate the horrific Alec Baldwin incident, but responsibly exercising our Second Amendment rights is a slightly higher bar than avoiding those types of incidents.

Seriously, such poor judgment is something we’ll be better off without in the long run. That type of stuff is ready-made fodder for the likes of Shannon Watts and other anti-Second Amendment extremists. Defending the Second Amendment is hard enough without those who hold themselves up as leaders and/or representatives doing something stupid.

I will admit that Cawthorn was a strong Second Amendment supporter. He certainly had a fighting spirit, but he also had a lot of other baggage that in the long run, would have harmed the fight to protect the Second Amendment. AmmoLand News readers would not hesitate to call out unsafe firearms handling at a range or in the home. Cawthorn needs to face the consequences, and they include losing this primary.

All the times Cawthorn owned an anti-Second Amendment extremist were canceled out by both of those screw-ups involving carry-on luggage.  Don’t get me wrong, Cawthorn is young, and maybe in the future, he can make some sort of comeback. I wish him the best. But in the short term, he is going to be a cautionary tale for Second Amendment supporters due to his own poor judgment.

In the future – and there is a lot of future ahead for Mr. Cawthorn – he may run for office again. In that event, Second Amendment supporters have to insist he show he has matured and learned from his mistakes. They also should insist on some level of common sense from those who hold themselves out as leaders in general.

This loss in a primary election will hold important lessons for Second Amendment supporters as they seek to defeat anti-Second Amendment extremists via the ballot box at the federal, state, and local levels.

About Harold Hutchison

Writer Harold Hutchison has more than a dozen years of experience covering military affairs, international events, U.S. politics and Second Amendment issues. Harold was consulting senior editor at Soldier of Fortune magazine and is the author of the novel Strike Group Reagan. He has also written for the Daily Caller, National Review, Patriot Post, Strategypage.com, and other national websites.