But substantively, Mitt Romney's wealth doesn't really matter. It's the tax code that matters.

"Governor Romney has paid 100% of what he owes," a Romney spokesperson said on a conference call this morning. I believe him. Mitt Romney is a remarkably successful businessman, and his wealthy reflects a legally gained fortune which is being taxed according to the law.

But the law doesn't make any sense! Consider that over the last two years, Romney has earned $13 million from profits shared by Bain Capital. You might have heard this money referred to as "carried interest." It is earned income. It represents the work of Bain Capital managers. But Romney's share is taxed at 15%, as capital gains, as though Romney's capital were stake at Bain, which it isn't. This freak tax windfall saves Romney, or deprives Treasury, of more than $2 million.

It's not that Romney tax return proves he's done something wrong. It's that his tax returns prove that the tax code is wrong. Households worth $200 million earning $20 million in investment income a year shouldn't be paying a lower tax rate than some middle class families, especially at a time when we're thinking about cutting spending that disproportionately benefits the lower and lower-middle class.

Romney's tax return could serve as an inflection point in the tax discussion. You might say it already has. Consider last night's TV debate, when Mitt Romney told Newt Gingrich that the former speaker's tax plan goes too far, since it would lower Romney's own tax rate to zero. This was a remarkable moment. The GOP frontrunner, who's won the endorsement of almost every serious conservative mainstay, stood athwart tax-cut-mania conservatism and said, "Stop." Or at least, he said: "Too far."

In an election that will be about inequality and taxes, Mitt Romney tax returns are a glowing artifact of inequality in the tax code. And by proposing to make capital gains entirely tax-free, Gingrich has proposed a tax plan that would make our law even more unequal. That's why, even without the polls, you can fairly say that Mitt Romney's tax returns matter.

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*We will be updating this post as we correspond over the course of the day with our friends at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, who are currently reviewing the documents.