The wildly ambitious career of President Obama shows that power is more valuable than money. Taxes, by their nature, are levied on things of value. If we want to close the budget gap, we should let the millionaires and billionaires have their tax breaks. Their private property fortunes are comparatively worthless. It's that treasure beyond the dreams of avarice, public political power, which needs an excise.

It's easy to do. Like everything, power has a price. And the price is right there in the federal budget -- $3.8 trillion in government spending for 2011. Tax it. The old "Bush tax cut" rate will suffice, 35 percent on high earners, or, in this case, 35 percent on high powers. What President Obama said about millionaires and billionaires will certainly hold true for congressmen, senators, and himself. "They want to give back to the country that's done so much for them." Thirty-five percent of $3.8 trillion is $1.3 trillion. That's most of the deficit eliminated through one small alteration in the tax code. And there's a further benefit to our nation. Now that all three branches of government and every federal agency, department, and bureau owe back taxes, the IRS can go audit itself.