If the 80-year-old vet living on the city’s West Side didn’t have the gun the city said he shouldn’t have, he and his 83-year-old wife and 12-year-old great-grandson might have joined those victims of gun violence about whom gun-control advocates constantly chirp.

From IBD Editorials

Second Amendment: Chicago is deciding whether to prosecute a great-grandfather and Korean War veteran under its handgun ban. He refused to be a victim, and now there’s one less armed thug roaming the streets. What’s the problem?

If the 80-year-old vet living on the city’s West Side didn’t have the gun the city said he shouldn’t have, he and his 83-year-old wife and 12-year-old great-grandson might have joined those victims of gun violence about whom gun-control advocates constantly chirp.

The vet obtained the gun in violation of the city’s handgun ban after a prior incident in which the couple was robbed at gunpoint by three armed intruders. So when Anthony Nelson — a parolee with a record of drug and gun arrests — tried breaking into their East Garfield Park home, they were ready.

Nelson fired twice at the as-yet-unnamed homeowner, who walks with a cane but retained enough of his military marksmanship to drop the intruder with a single gunshot to the chest. Yet in some quarters, instead of being hailed as a hero, it’s the homeowner who’s being considered a threat and the armed predator a victim of gun violence.

When asked if the 80-year-old would be charged for violating the city’s gun ban, Mayor Richard Daley, who recently threatened to put a gun up the posterior of a reporter questioning the ban’s effectiveness, said: “I don’t know. Thank you very much.” Of course, if the homeowner didn’t have the gun, he might not be alive to be charged.

Pressed further on the incident, Daley, who goes nowhere in the city without armed protection, cautioned that “guns is not the answer to the problems that we see in a home, in the streets of America. It’s as simple as that.” Sorry, mayor, but in this incident calling 911 was not an option and armed intruders do not obey gun bans.

Guns is the answer. It’s as simple as that.

Here is yet another example of guns saving lives — the side of the equation that never makes the headlines. In many instances, merely brandishing a firearm has been sufficient to thwart off an assault or home invasion, but instances of the successful defensive use of firearms never seem to make the headlines or the statistics.

Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass wrote in 2008 that in his city only two classes of people can possess firearms — criminals and politicians. Chicago politicians, he noted, either used their influence to “become deputized peace officers so they can carry” or “often go around surrounded by armed bodyguards on the city payroll.”

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