Supporters of the tax reform bill correctly point out that the law’s schedule of taxes, as presented, is revenue-neutral. Eighty percent of taxpayers will likely pay less under the law. Please look beyond these claims to the likely future effect.

The new taxes in the law represent little seeds for future mischief. Democratic lawmakers will water those little seeds with tears of sympathy for the many entitlement groups waiting to exchange their votes for taxpayer largess. Keeping track of the incremental and diverse upward bumps those taxes could receive over time might prove difficult. Democrats can play a complicated and (for them) winning shell game with that array of tax seeds, seeming to cut one tax while raising others.

I choose to re-establish the previous income tax-based tax configuration by voting “yes” on Question 1. The blunt force of those confiscatory tax rates stares the taxpayer right in the face. I shall furthermore vote for every conservative on the ballot come November. I support those who will cut spending instead of playing games with tax schedules that will only increase tax loads in the end.

Greece spent one of its earlier life stages in a state-of-Maine frame of mind. Way back then, Greek officials could have limited the growth of government and stopped pandering for votes with promises to the electorate of endless government largess. They didn’t, and the country went famously on to become the bankrupt Greece of recent violent street riots.

We can learn from their mistakes.

Leonard Hoy, Greenwood