I am sorely disappointed with your April 9 opinion piece "Time to change tax code."
Besides the fact that the editorial itself is a very thinly disguised promotion for Orrin Hatch's re-election bid, your final conclusion showed that you have no clue as to the real change needed.Your article lauds efforts to simplify or replace the tax code, but the sentiment you expressed concerning retaining tax exemptions is a slap in the face of any prospect of real progress for this issue.
Fairness and simplicity aside, the real need for changing the tax system is to return this nation to the ideals that our Founding Fathers had in mind. First and foremost, as represented in virtually every document created by those inspired leaders, they were insistent that the government should be accountable to its people -- not the other way around.
Our current tax system not only makes us accountable to government but also enslaves us in a way that allows the government to probe every aspect of our lives to ensure that they have received their fair share of our money. Each year we are required to give an accounting of our actions to our "slave master." The casual acceptance of this perverse slave/master relationship even has media and political pundits touting the virtues of census forms that demand information on all of the most intimate details of our lives (I received one of the long forms, I know).
What is truly needed is the replacement of the income-tax code with tariffs and sales taxes (structured in a way that eliminates taxes for basic life needs). We need to get Uncle Sam out of the private decisions of our lives.
William R. Bodine
Tooele