LETTERS: I’ve traveled the world — and Chicago is where I want to live

A letter writer from suburban Bartlett this week took issue with the argument, made in a Monday editorial, that the quality of life in Chicago is tough to beat. As a lifelong Chicagoan, I take issue with that kind of Chicago-bashing. The writer calls Chicago the nation’s “murder capital,” which, measured per capita, is not true. He also decries Chicago’s corruption, as if there is no corruption elsewhere. Our mayor standing up to the president seems to bother him, as well.

The quality of life in Chicago includes things like world-renowned hospitals, a beautiful lakefront, the parks, Lincoln Park Zoo, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, art museums and galleries, countless restaurants and world-class architecture, just to scratch the surface.

I have had the pleasure of traveling the world. I have yet to find a place I’d rather live. I am hardly in denial about our city’s problems; one must have his wits about him to live anywhere, except, apparently, Bartlett.

Peter Vilkelis, Lincoln Park

I had never heard of a ‘bump stock’ for a gun until the Las Vegas shootings. But here is another thing the so-called “gun experts” are probably not aware of. A sawed-off shotgun is highly illegal. No issue with that. But how many anti-gun activists are aware that a pistol with a 4-inch long barrel can be purchased legally that can fire shotgun shells? Taurus produces and sells “The Judge,” which is capable of shooting various calibers, including shotgun shells. Will this — or should this — gun be banned along with the bump stock?

Sawed-off shotguns are illegal, but a pistol with 4-inch barrel that shoots the same round is OK? Another fly in the ointment?

Daniel M. Filipek, Mount Prospect