It’s linked off the Obama campaign web site and was apparently authored and released on January 29. Christopher Markowski calls it “Red Dawn II” and says that it’s straight Communism. I’m not sure I’d go that far, but this section from page 3 contains a howler.

So, since some people are too lazy to work on their own retirement plan, let’s force employers to do all the work for them. That’s how the highlighted part of that reads. It requires work on the part of individual citizens, so let’s take the decision away from them unless they explicitly sign a paper taking it back.

From page 2, Obama opines on the IRS.

Pre-filled tax returns, eh? I bet a lot of people go for this, but I can think of two problems with it. First, will the IRS aggressively look for and include all of your legal deductions? Unlikely. Second, if the IRS fills out your tax form, are you indemnified if there’s a problem?

At six pages it’s pretty short, but if I had to characterize the Obama plan I would say that it emphasizes what the government can do too much and puts too little emphasis on what the private sector can do if the government gets out of its way. To the extent that the private sector is mentioned, it’s in the context of failure — mortgage mess, employer-employee retirement relationships, “predatory” credit card companies, etc — while the dynamism and power of the uniquely American free market isn’t acknowledged. That’s a shame, because our free market system powers the world and keeps us economically strong enough to be a beacon of strength and freedom. I’m not sure that Obama understands that.