Thanks for that interesting post, Hostage. I can second what you say about most CPAs preferring to do business planning, forecasting and other work than tax return prep.
As it relates to the President’s Tax Reform Commission, let me add that that panel published two reports. The first, published in around April of 05 was titled “America Needs a Better Tax System”. It was a compilation of the feedback they had gotten from the American public via town hall meetings, e-mails, etc. It was nothing less than a scathing indictment of the current system. Then they issued their final report in about November of that year. It basically recommended some minor “tweaks” to the current system and basically ignored its own earlier report. The evidence is overwhelming that the special interests weighed in between the time of the first report and the second and that the special interests and the lobbying industry won out.
Your comments on the lobbying positions of three of that panel’s members certainly fit into the pattern which is evident from the above sequence of events.
Yes indeed it is not difficult to see the hands of special interests and their lobbyists in subverting the latest attempt at tax reform.
I have made an obversation in politics that is easy to make, easy to conceptualize for different purposes but difficult to implement in new settings unless events align to trigger its existence.
The observation I am referring to is that government is most often a boring thing to watch for the bulk of the population, and even if there is interest it is time consuming and frustrating causing many to abandon any idea of participation, leaving only the diehards yelping about errors in judgement, misrepresentation of facts and bemoaning consequences.
This observation is sometimes accompanied by a related pedestrian observation that is often independent of the legislative process on Capitol Hill and which serves to rally the voting public into action. The Left is good at contriving these reactions by planning events, whereas the Right often waits for a lucky break in the form of a natural development.
A lucky break occurred last year in reference to comprehensive immigration reform. There were a series of marches, demostrations and public speaking events where illegal Hispanics attempted to show their numbers and the power in their numbers. This backfired on the organizers of these events as it woke up the American voting public to rally and execute a backlash against the power brokers pushing immigration reform. Needless to say many US Senators were stunned at the rage and anger of the electorate against their reform efforts, which were viewed as business as usual.
But it took hundreds of thousands of illegals marching and the cumulative observations of millions of Americans at witnessing illegals on nearly every street corner to understand that Congress was out of touch with the reality on the ground and seemingly against the will of the people.
There is no question that the American public is now enraged at the tax mess it faces. However, there are no similar observations of street corners or organized events that get in the face of voters and serve to make tax reform an incendiary matter. We wait to see what Congress will propose.
In the next days I am scheduled to present a proposal plan to put the tax mess and its consequences in all of our faces everywhere we go. I will be presenting before some very important FairTax leaders. It will possibly involve the introduction of new legislation. We will see how it goes.
By the way Mike Huckabee is reported to be at the top of the list as VP for the McCain ticket. That is very good news. He has taken a very bad rap from some so-called conservatives here on Free Republic. Many of the current cohort of posters on this forum have shown a tendency to swallow bad information without doing expected due diligence. I call it being lazy. I see it a degradation in the forums here. Whereas there were once many posters that shared deep understanding and insight, there are now more shallow minded hecklers. It has caused me to post on other blogs and then post repetitions here.