I disagree on how good it is
The estate tax has done a pretty good job of what was supposed to do, and has aged reasonably gracefully. And I say this despite personally knowing people who have been adversely affected by this. (My sister-in-law's parents owned a house on the Jersey Shore which, well you know the scenario.)
I know you disagree on how graceful it is, but considering how many decades it has been around, I'm impressed. According to [link|http://www.faireconomy.org/estatetax/ETHistory.html|this] it settled on its current form in the mid-30s. Compare that with another specific tax on the wealthy which was introduced much later. Which tax do you think does its original job with less collateral damage today, the estate tax or the AMT? Is there any real comparison?
Furthermore I think that fixing it is pretty easy. Just raise the bar for who is affected and make that be indexed to inflation. (I'd also want to increase the rate on the taxed amount, but leave that debate for another day.)
By contrast my big fear is that the United States will devolve into a plutocracy. In fact to a good extent it already has (what portion of federal politicians have great inherited wealth?), and I'm therefore against any change that could accelerate that trend.
Cheers,
Ben
