Just days after the presidential election, Barack Obama had a new website that featured his plans for the United States during his administration: Change.gov. The “change” that was promised to the voters appears to be a government that is more expansive and more expensive, according to this site. The following is a list of President-elect Obama’s proposed legislation, policies, and spending. It should be noted that this is not an exhaustive list and that these proposals* are only the current plans for this new administration. Like nearly all presidents before him, he will undoubtedly expand this list as the weeks and months go by.

So, without further delay, here are the intended plans for the United States under the leadership of Barack Obama as of November 9, 2008.

Proposed Legislation:

Fair Pay Act
Employment Non-Discrimination Act
Matthew Shepard Act
Windfall Profits Tax
Patriot Employer Act of 2007
Employee Free Choice Act
STOP FRAUD Act
Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families Act

In addition to these, Obama also wants to:

- Ban “racial profiling” by federal law enforcement agencies
- Pass legislation “to provide funding to school districts to invest in intervention strategies in middle school” to address the “dropout crisis”
- Implement cap-and-trade legislation on American businesses
- Force employers to provide seven paid sick days per year to their employees
- Pass “universal health legislation”
- Raise the federal minimum wage to $9.50 per hour by 2011

Legislation to be Repealed, Amended, or Stopped:

NAFTA (amended)
CAFTA (stopped)
Repeal the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) “Kentucky River” decisions
Repeal laws that allow for the permanent replacement of striking workers
Reverse the Bush tax cuts “for the wealthiest taxpayers” (increase taxes on “the wealthiest taxpayers”)

New Federal Programs and Entities:

Military Families Advisory Board
Civilian Assistance Corps (CAC) – 25,000 personnel
State Growth Fund - $25 billion
Jobs and Growth Fund - $25 billion
Advanced Manufacturing Fund
National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank - $6 billion per year
National Health Insurance Exchange
Global Education Fund - $2 billion
Shared Security Partnership Program - $5 billion
Grid Modernization Commission
Green Jobs Corps
Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS)
Affordable Housing Trust Fund
Rural Revitalization Program
America’s Voice Initiative
Social Investment Fund Network
Teacher Service Scholarships
Teacher Residency Programs

In addition to these named entities and programs, a President Obama plans to do the following:

- Invest in clean energy and green jobs - $15 billion per year
- Create an “energy-focused youth jobs program”
- Create “a national network of public-private business incubators” - $250 million per year
- Provide startup funding for states to adopt paid-leave systems - $1.5 billion
- Create a “Zero to Five” plan for childhood education, fund early learning Challenge Grants to promote state “Zero to Five”, “provide affordable and high quality child care”, and create a Presidential Early Learning Council - $10 billion per year
- Create a national “Make College a Reality” initiative
- Create an “independent watchdog agency to oversee the investigation of congressional ethics violations”
- Create automatic workplace pensions
- Establish “Retirement Savings” incentives – government will match 50% of first $1000 of savings for families earning less than $75,000 per year
- Require businesses to pay fines if they do not provide health care coverage or make a “meaningful contribution” to health care coverage
- Institutionalize the Proliferation Security Initiative (IPS)
- Establish a new “international nuclear energy architecture”
- Establish a grant program for state and local intelligence
- Provide at least $2 billion for services to Iraqi refugees
- Invest in transitional jobs and career pathway programs - $200 million per year
- Create “prison-to-work” incentive program
- Create 20 “Promise Neighborhoods” which will provide “a full network of services…to an entire neighborhood from birth to college”
- Establish a new program “to identify and train the next generation of farmers”
- Provide capital for farmers
- Establish a small business and micro-enterprise initiative for rural America
- Create an agency within the Corporation for National and Community Service to build on the country’s non-profit sector

Expansions of Existing Government Programs and Entities:

- Increase the Army by 65,000 personnel
- Increase the Marines by 27,000 personnel
- Double funding for Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP)
- Double funding for science and technology
- Double funding for 21st Century Learning Centers program
- Quadruple Early Head Start funding
- Double funding for Federal Charter School Program
- Expand Nurse-Family Partnership to all low-income, first-time mothers
- Double foreign assistance to $50 billion per year for Millennium Development Goal
- Double funding for Jobs Access and Reverse Commute program
- Fully fund the Community Development Block Grant program
- Expand AmeriCorps from 75,000 to 250,000 – Establish a Classroom Corps, Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, Veteran Corps, and Homeland Security Corps
- Double the Peace Corps to 16,000 by 2011

In addition to these specific increases, Obama also has plans for vague expansions of other government programs:

- Add to Maritime Pre-Positioning Force Squadrons
- “Build up the capacity of each non-Pentagon agency”
- Increase funding for federal workforce training programs
- Expand Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA)
- Increase Head Start funding
- “Expand service scholarships to recruit and prepare teachers who commit to working in underserved districts”
- Provide additional resources to the federal Community Development Financial Fund and the Small Business Administration
- Expand Youth Build program
- Expand service-learning – “all middle and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year”
- Increase funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP)
- Expand Senior Corps

New or Expanded/Extended Tax Credits:

- Create “Making Work Pay” tax credit - $500 per person, $1000 per family
- Extend Production Tax Credit
- Create “Universal Mortgage” Credit – 10% refundable credit (approx. $5 billion)
- Expand Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit – make it refundable
- Create American Opportunity Tax Credit - $4000 refundable credit on college tuition in exchange for 100 hours of community service
- “Purchasing Advanced Vehicles” Tax Credit - $7000
- Expand Earned-Income Tax Credit by three to six times the current amount
- Create “Small Business Health” Tax Credit
- Create Tax Credit for insurance premiums to “everyone who needs it”
- Expand Savers Credit

As stated at the beginning, this is not an exhaustive list. There are many other vague references of expansion or “investing” in new programs. His health care policies alone (according to Obama’s estimates) are projected to cost $50-65 billion per year. But if past estimates of government programs are an indication of what will happen in the future, we should expect that this is severely underestimated. Even more laughable than that is the notion that all of these proposals will be paid for by ending the war in Iraq and making cuts in other unspecified areas of the federal government – which is extremely unlikely to happen, given the government’s track-record. But let us address the Iraq argument for a moment.

Barack Obama claims that by ending the Iraq War we will save billions of dollars a month. But instead of simply ending the war and saving the additional money that is allegedly “bankrupting” our economy, Obama plans to spend it on other programs. He does not intend to do the fiscally responsible thing and not spend the additional money that we don't have – he plans to use the increased war-time budget on new programs altogether. The result is not savings to the taxpayers…it is a net increase in annual government pre-war spending. An Obama administration will simply retain the bloated federal budget (which is currently a net deficit) and use the money on new domestic social programs. In other words, he will “bankrupt” the economy because of social programs instead of defense spending (which is one of the intended purposes of our federal government and taxation).

In addition to the massive expansions of the federal government, Obama also plans to meet with dictators and leaders of terrorist regimes without preconditions and will surrender our progress in Iraq. He plans to give amnesty to illegal aliens who have violated our immigration laws. He wants to fine businesses – including CAFO’s (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations) – for carbon dioxide “pollution,” which is based on the fraudulent “man-made global warming” hypothesis. He also wants to force “green” technology into the market – despite the increased costs. And contrary to his rhetoric and promises of “new politics” and “post-partisan” collaboration, the first appointment in his new administration was soon-to-be White House Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel – one of the most partisan politicians in Washington, a former senior advisor to President Clinton, and a product of Chicago “machine” politics.

The American People had been sold a bill of goods in this last election cycle. Barack Obama is nothing “new” and his policies are certainly not going to “change” the course of this country – except to move us further along the path of government intrusion into our daily lives, our wallets, and the markets. The writing has been on the wall and a majority of the People are either blind, illiterate, speak a different language, or are otherwise incapable of comprehending it.

*All proposals are not to be construed as negative simply because of their mention in this article.

**UPDATE, 11-10-08: The Change.gov website was apparently "scrubbed" late Saturday night, according to The Washington Times. Here's a link to the story:

EXCLUSIVE: Agenda Disappears from Obama Web site