While I have many gripes with AARP, they provide a free service for us older folk. I think Weyden's plan has to come into play, I hope it is equatable to the lower and middle class. 15% across the board is not fair and again the middle class picks up the tab. Kinda like the Dimmos selling out on corp. kicker, and welfare for corp. Amerika. How quiet they are on a referendum on corp kicker being put into the rainy day fund. One time and we are pacified?

If you want equity in the tax system, you clearly should not vote Republican.

Nor if you want peace, justice, security, economic stability, or respect abroad.

I've always done my own taxes, but increasingly feel that it's foolish. I use turbotax to do it, but it requires an act of faith that the program is doing the right things with the numbers I enter, since there doesn't seem to be a way to figure out how its calculations (for example, for depreciation or even for capital gains) are made.

If you've got children and make too much income to take the child credit, there's a way to have one child claim the credit on the other. TurboTax is fairly incompetent on that issue.

equity? ive voted for the person who has won the presidency since my first vote in 72. i dont remember either party doing much to minimize my tax burden. i think democrats run oregon and the city of portland.... are you happy with all of the fees, and taxes you pay now? didnt your govenor promise to raise taxes and the good sheep of oregon all took one step forward and said "please sir take more of my money" before you bash me i think the republicans are equally corrupt. joco

"If you want equity in the tax system, you clearly should not vote Republican"
Show me the difference...both are corrupt.The need for more parties has never been greater.

Jack, do you see the bipartisan call for AMT reform to be a window of opportunity for what another commenter called "simplifimacation" of the IRC? Or will Congress just take the easy road and index the AMT threshold to the CPI?

I don't think they'll just index the AMT exemptions, although I would hope and pray that that's part of it. I think there will be some more meaningful moves attempted with respect to the AMT. Congress will be trying to get the upper middle class out of AMT Land entirely, but that will require finding new revenue sources. In the latter category, they'll try to pass some combination of "getting touch on the underground economy" (which will be mostly b.s.) and scaling back some of the Bush-Cheney giveaways to the trust fund set.

Wide-ranging simplimafication (however spelled) of the tax law would require a spirit of compromise that we're not likely to see for another decade or so. There could even be a veto or two ahead. I think TurboTax's market share is secure for quite a while.

15% across the board is not fair

How is that not fair? 15% is a lot less than I pay now, and with all the loopholes & crazy deductions I bet its more than what most of the "rich" pay.