In addition to his demurrer on the tax gap, as Matt notes below, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson also begged off yesterday on another matter of tax policy that had been a major Bush administration priority, telling the Senate Finance Committee: There isn't a major tax reform proposal being put forward now, and I don't see that on the dockets in the near future. So much for all that brave talk out of Congress about fundamental tax reform that we noted earlier this year, and the (now-languishing) recommendations offered in November 2005 by the president's own tax reform advisory commission. So, what is left of the Paulson portfolio? Is Paulson doomed to follow in the tradition of Paul (friend of Bono) O'Neill and John (Social Security privatization) Snow as another irrelevant, ineffective Bush Treasury Secretary, wondering why oh why he ever left the private sector?