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Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine continue to be on the short end of the debate over tax policy with Donald Trump and Mike Pence.

There is no good reason for it, either. The Democrats have a tax plan that is better for most families than the Republicans’ version. But the Democratic plan is sufficiently complex that it often sounds worse.

I wrote about this issue last week, and it was on display again during the vice-presidential debate. Pence cast himself and Trump as tax cutters (“lowering taxes across the board for working families, small businesses and family farms”) and Clinton and Kaine as tax hikers (“advocating a trillion dollars in tax increases”).