DEROY MURDOCK: Trump’s Delicious Tax Cut.

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) proposes a simple postcard for filing typical tax returns. Rather than the current 1040 form’s 79 lines, Ryan’s postcard contains 14. With nearly every deduction and exemption discarded — beside the home-mortgage and charitable write-offs — there simply would be fewer lines to fill.

This should cheer Americans who struggle to machete their way through today’s tax system. The IRS’s Amazon jungle is impenetrable, menacing, and plagued by pitfalls at every turn. Last month in North Dakota, Trump called America’s tax structure “outdated, complex, and extremely burdensome.” He further lamented the “billions of hours wasted on paperwork and on compliance.” He added: “Our tax code is a giant self-inflicted economic wound.”

Genuine reform isn’t just cutting rates or eliminating brackets, it’s making the tax code transparent and free of cronyism. That’s why the bipartisan Tax Reform Act of 1986 was so revolutionary, and why it was so quickly corrupted by succeeding Administrations and Congresses.