eugene steuerle -- eugene robinson argues, the fog of war's and. to be always have unintended consequences. -- they always have unintended consequences. a lot of opinions in the paper. john mccain, ryan crocker, stephen hadley all right thing in the papers. bloomingdale -- bloomfield hills, michigan. caller: thank you for c-span. i am just so proud of what our president is doing. he is keeping his word and bringing our american heroes home with dignity and honor that they deserve. nobody is firing at them. they are not being chased out. these folks are coming home and i think it is a proud moment for america. it is a -- historical. and what he is doing in afghanistan has to be done. host: it says in the papers today that the president will call former president bush before his speech and talk to him. do you think the president either privately or publicly should give president bush credit for the progress in iraq, tell the american people that the surge did work? caller: absolutely not. what our president barack obama was against the war from the b

host: eugene steuerle, let me read in this headline. moe berg-led economic panel pushes lawmakers to simplify the tax code -- volcker-led economic panel. a group that was looking at taxes. 7.6 million hours are spent doing taxes and 140 billion a year to comply with the tax code. since 1986 when congress and the administration overhauled the tax code, the code has been changed 15,000 times. you were part of the discussion in 1984 and in 1985 leading up to the 1986 reform. what does it mean it has been changed 15,000 times for the work that you did back then? guest: it means we have not simplified, that is for sure. it also means taxpayers are constantly subjects to more and more uncertainty, not just respect to what is happening in the past but uncertain as to what will happen in the future. it makes planning heart, it makes the cost of compliance hard. it is actually a hard tax code to enforce. if you are sitting at the irs and an agent, and you are not sure what is coming. it has created difficulties. it is clearly not the way we want