During all the post-election hoopla I started to hear rumblings that one of Bush's primary tasks in the second term was "tax reform". The notion of Bush and Co. leading a charge on tax reform sent shivers down my spine, because although no specifics were offered this would probably mean one of three things:
1) A flat tax
2) A national sales tax
3) A continuation of their current policy of reducing the tax burden on capital and increasing it on wages
Personally, I'm not a big fan of any of these options. Now, some pundits have stated that Bush may have no intention of major tax changes, and this is basically a ploy to get big business to pony up campaign contributions before the 2006 elections. Although this is a possibility I personally think these guys are going to go for it all and I'm a little concerned that there has not been much discussion about how we are preparing for this.
I hope everyone can see the frame that is being attempted by the conservatives on this issue. There have been references for some time by the administration that tax cheating is a problem but their take on it is that there is no way to stop the cheating so we might as well scrap the system. Also, they have tried to push the notion that tax preparation costs too much money. I personally hope and think that most people will see through these last two points as a bunch of crap, but in general Democrats will have a hard time arguing against "tax reform". The idea of reforming the tax system is a very positive notion for most people and whoever claims the reformer mantle first may win this debate. In fact I saw Barack Obama on the Sunday shows explaining his position on tax reform and although he did well it took him way to long to answer. Also, I don't want progressives to be playing defense on this one. We should have a proactive position on this, and shouldn't reform be a progressive idea? Unfortunately I think I have more questions than answers on this one.