English has more shadings on words than most languages. The differences between run, trot, jog, dash, scamper, hurtle, lope, and hustle are subtle - until you want exactly the right one to convey your meaning.
The spelling of the words is what gives us a clue to their source and therefore, meaning. It allows vocabulary to be something other than rote memorization. As it is, if you learn two hundred greek and latin root words, you’ll be able to understand most complicated words.
I’m a software engineer. I look at things with both an engineering perspective - is this useful, how could it be more useful - and an artist’s - is this beautiful, could it be more gracious. My hobby is writing and as such I pay attention to the utility of my medium, the English language. It seems to me that writing in Spanish would be like painting with three colors which you are not allowed to blend. Writing in English is like painting with a million shades. If it means kids take a while to learn proper spelling, fine, but giving up our rich heritage for ease of spelling just isn’t worth it.
One of the most brilliant teachers I've ever sat under. Stanley S. Ward PhD, explained why English poetry is the best in the world. English, you see, is a shotgun wedding of two contrasting linguistic streams -- the germanic (Anglo Saxon -- that 20% of our vocabulary used 80% of the time) and romantic (French). You can dip from either pool, depending on the effect you wish to convey. And the antagonism/tension between these strands makes it very hard to write good poetry -- but the results, when you succeed, are indeed noteworthy.