I pushed no direct relationship between the Republican tax cuts and forex markets; it is the apologists for these things that maintain, with a completely straight face, that the tax cuts have "proved a boon" for the economy (I am quoting). And that being their argument, I have to point out that people who know more about economics than I do - the people in Singapore and Mumbai and Frankfurt and London and Hongkong who buy and sell the currencies of the world - do not seem in the least impressed with them.

As for the abuse of or defence against death duties, let me quote a legal maxim: abusum non tollit usum. The fact that people try more or less successfully to dodge a law does not prove that that law is wrong. It only proves that it ought to be enforced more firmly.