WORKERS OF THE WORLD, UNITE! Mickey Kaus comments on the Democrats’ plan to repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax for people in the $100-500K income range:

Washington Monthly’s Charles Peters mocks the “new proletariat” of Americans in the “$100,000-$500,000 income range,” especially their agitation against the Alternative Minimum Tax. … My impression is the main complaint against the AMT is not the extra tax it extracts but the extra paperwork hassle it imposes on those who essentially have to calculate their tax two times, using different sets of rules (or, almost as annoying, pay an accountant to do it for them) … I would think the anti-bureaucratic Wash. Monthly would join in the fraternal struggle against unnecessary government-imposed complications–realizing that Washington could probably collect a lot more tax money, indeed more money from the complaining top 20%, and if only it did so with less hassle.

The hassle is an issue. So is the money. And the Dems have a lot of key constituents in those brackets. Kaus has some interesting observations on Chuck Hagel’s positioning, too.