House Ways and Means Committee chair Charles B. Rangel (D-NY) has long and loudly said that he "wants to "rearrange" the Bush tax cuts, shifting tax relief from the wealthiest beneficiaries to the middle-class victims of the AMT. Rangel reminds us frequently that he's 76 (remember, green bananas?) and serious-minded about solving the AMT promblem promptly and simply -- sans Rube Goldberg extranea. Query whether Rangel's colleague devising a clever but complex AMT reform package, Rep. Richard Neal (D-MA), is entirely eye-to-eye with Rangel. Based on an interview with BNA ($) on the relative merits of his package and the plan offered this week by the Tax Policy Center (TPC), Neal seems to have dismissed the TPC plan out of hand: That's not our plan ... that's the game plan and we're not going to retreat on it. [A JCT study that was the basis for the TPC plan] shows that the AMT is really hitting the middle class and it reinforces my position. Press reports indicate that Rangel seriously is weighing the TPC plan, perhaps on the grounds of simplicity and saleability. Architect of the TPC plan Len Burman points out: Representative Neal has worked long and hard to spare the middle class from the AMT. I admire him greatly for that. My plan would achieve his objective in an extremely simple and progressive way. May the best plan win!