But in many communities around the country, there are other threats that are much less of an abstraction than tin pot dictators, insane snipers and fanatical Islamic bombers.

    Despite living in a relatively low crime area, many of my South Philadelphia neighbors live with a sense of unease due to violence and criminals. The view is that you’re more likely to be assaulted around the corner than caught in the next World Trade Center-type attack.

    My neighbor, a young mother, witnessed an armed robbery at a local drug store while shopping with her ten-year-old son one Saturday afternoon. Clutching her child, she pulled him and another terrified customer behind a counter as the robbers pointed their guns at the helpless and frightened cashier.

    A friend who owns and operates a South Philly corner tavern was the victim of a gun-toting, mask-wearing armed robber. His bartender, a young woman, became so frightened that she could not open the cash register and hand over the money that the gun-waving criminal was demanding.

    A customer tried to help, but he didn’t how to open the register, even under threat of being shot and killed. According to witnesses, he looked like a piano player as he pounded on the register’s keys. Finally, he was able to open the register and handed over the cash receipts.

    The armed robber grabbed the money and attempted to flee when one customer tackled him as another customer hit the robber with a chair. Although they initially blocked his escape, he managed to get up and run out the door after firing off a shot. He leaped into an accomplice’s car and they sped off.

    The armed robber was later arrested in yet another robbery and my friend heard from the police that he had been on a spree of robbing bars, of which my friend’s place was the third bar targeted.

    Violent armed robbery is not limited to corner businesses or to any one age group. A bike-borne gang of youths robbed a 15-year-old boy at gunpoint as he was returning home from shopping at 8 o’clock at night. They took his cash, cell phone and recent purchases of sports clothing. An elderly man in our neighborhood was the victim of a vicious home invasion. The armed thieves threatened to kill him and then bound and gagged him. They ransacked his home in the pursuit of the few valuables the poor man owned. Other home invasions victims have been severely beaten and sexually assaulted.

    Crime statistics show that criminal acts like these are rare in my police district, but statistics are no defense against a gun-toting criminal and being told you are the victim of an aberrant crime is little consolation. And of course there are communities around the country where theses crimes are a daily occurrence.

    Growing up in South Philly during the 1950s and 1960s, I recall when our close-knit community left doors and windows unlocked. Friends and family freely entered each other’s homes and socialized without the fear of armed intruders. Today, many of those doors and windows are locked, grated and wired to burglar alarm systems. Family dogs are now much more than a pet – they also serve as watchdogs. Some of my neighbors, like me, own handguns

    Crimes like assault, rape and the kidnapping of children seem much more of an eminent threat than the acts of terrorism one reads about or views on the TV.

    The FBI defines terrorism as the unlawful use of force and violence by more than one person to coerce a government or the civilian population in the furtherance of political or social objectives. But in a literal sense, what can be more terrifying than having a desperate, dim and fearless criminal wave a gun in your face?

    Although I fully support the coming war with Iraq and the ongoing war on terrorism, I was concerned that the attention on Iraq and terrorists will overshadow the constant threat of armed and dangerous criminals in our own backyards.

    My concerns were somewhat allayed when, as I wrote in my last column, "On Guns and Crime," U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft visited Philadelphia on January 30^th and spoke to 1,300 federal prosecutors, state and local law enforcement officers from across the country about the federal government’s program to get bad guys – and their illegal guns – off the street.

    The federal program, called Project Safe Neighborhoods, held their national conference in a city with its share of violent gun crime.

    Most of the law enforcement officers I’ve talked to agree that the solution to gun crime is stiff sentencing – get the hard-core criminals off the street. Philly cops and DAs, like their counterparts in other cities, often complain that local judges are far too lenient and prefer to see the case go to a federal judge, who they say are tougher on criminals.

    Few gun control advocates applaud the Safe Neighborhoods project, as they still maintain that more laws and limits on the purchasing of guns is the answer. But, I would counter, criminals don’t go to gun stores and legally purchase firearms.

    Three Philadelphia men were recently arrested for bank robbery. The federal indictment charged the three with one count of conspiracy to commit armed bank robbery, one count of armed bank robbery, and one count of using and carrying a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence. One of the three was also charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

    The three face possible maxim sentences of life imprisonment, with a mandatory minimum of seven years imprisonment, as well as fines ranging from $1,000,000 to $500,000. This, it seems to me, is true gun control.

    At an earlier convention held in Philadelphia, I heard a retired general tell a group of law enforcement, security and counterterrorism professionals that the war on terrorism, like the war on crime, might never end.

    The Bush administration appears to be effectively fighting on both fronts.