Yeah, yeah, I know, politics is the art of the possible yada yada. Still,
though I hate to be a wet blanket, I’m bound to say I couldn’t care less
about the tax cut. I have a comparatively simple financial life, yet it has
been my experience that come tax time, nobody knows what my taxes due should
be to better than a five per cent margin. I mean, if I went to a dozen
different accountants with my papers, I’d get a dozen different numbers for
my taxes due, varying in a range of plus or minus five per cent around some
mean. Any tax benefit to me from the Bush plan is just lost in this fuzzy
penumbra. I assume a lot of other people have even fuzzier ones. The U.S.
tax code is desperately in need of simplification, and the kind of tinkering
being done in this latest plan, while worthy and well-intentioned, is deeply
unimpressive to me–and, I would guess, to a lot of other voters.