In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Clint Eastwood is asked about the new governor of California and uses the opportunity to advocate a simple and fair flat tax.
“But I’ll tell you when I liked him—and I wasn’t a registered Democrat—but I liked him when he was running for president [in 1992] on the flat tax. . . . A ton of economists, both liberal and conservative, have argued for a flat tax, but nobody’s ever had the nerve to do it. . . . It would simplify things, but simplification doesn’t seem to be in the human psyche.”
It’s always good to get endorsements from the right kind of celebrities. Years ago, the nation’s most infamous shock jock, Howard Stern, praised the flat tax. I used to listen to Stern every day, so that was a win-win situation from my perspective, but I realized that he wasn’t universally admired.
Clint Eastwood isn’t nearly as controversial, so perhaps he can be the public face of tax reform. Actually, maybe he’s the actor who should have been governor of California. Unlike Schwarzenegger, he would have known how to deal with greedy special interest groups.
I’m no Dirty Harry, so I can only push for a flat tax with words.
