Obama discriminates â€“ against gun owners

Try and remember the last time you sat down for a job interview.

If you filled out an employment application, you know that certain blatantly discriminatory questions can't be asked. For example, you can't be asked if you are black, white or Asian. You can't be asked what your age is, what your sex is, whether or not you're married, whether you have pre-existing medical conditions, or if you are a Christian or a Muslim or a Jew. You can't be asked if you have been arrested, or if you're a member of the Knights of Columbus, the National Organization for Women or National Council of La Raza.

All of those questions have been deemed to be discriminatory and, therefore, out of bounds for employers to ask. However, in examining the first document created by President-elect Barack Obama, the "White House Personnel Data Questionnaire" – which is a model that can used by all agencies of the federal government – he has made it clear that discriminatory practices are to be a hallmark of his administration and that he particularly intends to discriminate against hunters and gun owners.

It is remarkable the mainstream media are ignoring the implications of this politically unacceptable and intrusive questionnaire. After all, that same media obsessively covered alleged political intrusions involving hiring practices under the U.S. Justice Department when it was headed by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

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One of Obama's 63 questions for applicants who wish to work for the federal government is:

Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun? If so, provide complete ownership and registration information. Has the registration ever lapsed? Please also describe how and by whom it is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage.

The only discernable reason this question about handgun, rifle or shotgun ownership would be asked is the same reason employers used to ask job seekers about their race, gender, age or ethnic background – that is, solely for the purpose of discriminating against the applicant. Indeed, this marks the first time a president has ever asked potential administration employees if they are exercising one of their constitutional rights as part of the weeding-out process.

And yes, the question is almost certainly designed for "weeding-out." Given his long history of hostility toward gun owners, it is highly unlikely that the president-elect is searching for able servants who answer "yes" to his gun ownership question. After all, this is the same Barack Obama who:

endorsed a complete ban on handgun ownership;
endorsed a 500 percent increase in the federal excise tax on firearms and ammunition; and
supports mandatory firearms registration (and in the questionnaire, Obama makes it clear that this includes handguns, shotguns and rifles).

Obama also asks how the handgun, rifle or shotgun is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage – bowing to the utterly false notion that firearms are inherently dangerous or their owners prone to misuse. This would mean if you've ever used a firearm to protect yourself, you must describe the situation. This question seems to indicate President-elect Obama still holds an animus toward the idea of self-defense, and it reconfirms his vote in the Illinois Legislature to uphold local gun bans and the criminal prosecution of homeowners who use banned firearms to defend themselves and their loved ones from violent criminals.

Appallingly, the question also asks applicants to submit their gun "ownership and registration information." To whom this private information is to be given is unclear, but this is an outrageous request considering only seven states in our nation, including Obama's home state of Illinois, require some form of gun registration. Firearms owners and freedom advocates have vehemently fought, and for the most part successfully, any form of gun registration. They wage this battle for good reason. The most horrific episodes in the history of the world have taught us that gun registration invariably leads to gun confiscation, as well as wholesale massacres and serious government abuse of law-abiding citizenry.

That Obama would ask for gun registration information tells us one of two things. Either he is completely ignorant of the near universal right of American gun owners not to be forced to register their firearm with the government (this is possible), or the president-elect is tipping his hand to law-abiding gun owners and revealing the agenda he has in store for them (this is more likely).

In effect, what President-elect Obama has accomplished with this question is a mandatory gun registration program for prospective federal employees – a list of gun owners that would be available to government agencies at the federal level. And if that were not intrusive enough, he is even requiring potential employees to register their family members' guns as well.

This question demands answers, though not the answers Obama is seeking. If he is truly interested in transparency, Obama should disclose why this question is in his questionnaire, who drafted it and what purpose it serves.

Otherwise, reasonable people are left to believe that the sole purpose of this questionnaire is to help our newly elected Discriminator in Chief weed out law-abiding citizens – some 80 million Americans – who, as he put it in San Francisco earlier this year, "cling to their guns."

If President-elect Obama truly wants to bring all Americans together, he should not support a policy designed to tear us apart.

There is no question that if Barack Obama can get away with registering the guns of his federal appointees and their family members, then all federal agencies may follow the same road. There would also be little stopping state and local government agencies, and even private-sector employers (20 percent of whom believe only the police and military should own guns) from doing the same. If Obama can discriminate against gun owners at the highest level of American government, then there is no reason to believe that lesser government agencies cannot adopt the same stance – and refuse employment to gun owners who seek government employment as teachers, social workers, Peace Corps volunteers or volunteers in the "civilian national security force" Obama has called for.

President-elect Obama, as the first non-hunting, non-gun-owning president, needs to make it clear that he will not discriminate against this core group of Americans who exercise their God-given constitutional right to keep and bear arms.