GOP leaders repeat, almost as a mantra, that the estate tax, which they call the "death tax," should be repealed because it is immoral to tax a person after death. The Democrats have failed to raise even the obvious corollary: What makes it moral to tax the wages of a living person, but not the wealth left by someone who is dead? —David Johnston, in the New York Times.

i'm hoping that 2001 will be the year that i move up the scale into the upper lower class. then, i'll be king of the barrio/retirement mecca that is my neighborhood.