There’s an old adage that says the first rule of a gunfight is to bring a gun.

Apparently, no one told this Washington state robber that bringing a knife instead might not be the brightest of ideas.

From Guns.com:

“I pulled out my gun — like this — and I pointed it right at him, and he ran,” said Ho. When prompted, he showed off his handgun, which looks to be an IWI Jericho 941 that he keeps in a leather thumb break holster attached to the counter.

Police are reportedly still searching for the suspect, who was only inside the store for a few seconds before he broke for the door.

Now, let’s say the police never find this guy. Let’s say he walks around scot-free and is never called to account for his crime.

While that’s not ideal, let’s also think about what will go through his head for the rest of his days. He’ll remember the time he tried to rob someone and got a good look at the business end of a handgun. He will see that and (hopefully) factor that into future decisions.

Who knows? Maybe this will scare him onto the straight and narrow path. Maybe the next time he thinks about breaking the law, he’ll think about the look of Mr. Ho’s pistol and remember that there are people out there who have no interest in being sheep waiting to be preyed upon.

Or maybe next time he’ll just try a different store.

Either way, Ho is alive and well with one hell of a story to tell, and the only thing I suspect the robber got was some extra weight pulling his undies down in the immediate aftermath.

The truth of the matter is that if more of these robbers were met with this kind of resistance, guess what would happen? If you said, “They’d probably stop being robbing piece of filth and get real jobs,” then give yourself a prize. That’s exactly what would happen, especially if a large number got all-expenses-paid trips to the afterlife for their stupidity.

I don’t want to see people die, as a general rule, but I’m realistic enough to know that if the occupation becomes too high of a risk, people will find other things to do. This especially considering the relatively low amount of money to be had in these smaller stores. Even criminals can figure out the idea of risk versus reward. They might risk it for millions, but not for a couple hundred, at most.

And, frankly, if a few of these guys die in the act, I’m not going to feel sorry for them either. They decided to prey off the law-abiding, so they deserve whatever harm befalls them.

Just think about people like Mr. Ho. Those are the kind of people anti-gunners are going to disarm, regardless of what they claim. The criminals will still commit crimes. It’s what they do. Gun control just stops us from having the best means possible to stop those crimes.