The new guy will understand

We have a new secretary of the treasury. Timothy K. Geithner was not able to handle his personal tax affairs. Now he is in charge of the nation's tax system.

He is not the first prominent person to blame tax problems on the complexity of the tax codes. Perhaps he will oversee sweeping changes to the tax code? Since rewriting an already complex code adds to the complexity of the system, Geithner is the perfect choice to oversee the scrapping of the system as we know it.

May I suggest the FairTax? This would eliminate the complexities of the present system and replace it with a national sales tax. The tax burden would be placed on those who spend the most (the ones who have the most). There would be no loopholes for tax lawyers to find. If you don't like that idea, how about the flat tax? But I am sure that the Harvard- and Yale-educated lawyers we have running our government would revise that into a masterpiece of complexity within a short time.

That is OK. I know nothing will change. More loopholes will be written in. The code will grow more complex. And we will continue to be ruled by the elite. At least it is not as if the IRS will crack down on us if we make a sloppy mistake on our taxes, right? Geithner will understand.

ROBERT TRANKLE, Chaffee, Mo.