Death and Taxes: Interesting article from Slate on the GOP's abandonment of the flat tax. I'm not about to go toe-to-toe with a Cato Institute devotee, but this article boils the issue down to a simple choice. Either you want deductions (and instant gratification) or you want the flat tax and its incumbent (one theorizes) long term benefits in savings and investment. What I never considered before is that big business will give up its deductions when you pry them out of their cold, dead hands, and that is why the GOP isn't pushing this forward. Good stuff.