- Lesson for today, from Paul Krugman, from Hannah Arendt: “Totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with those crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty.”
- With examples of E.J. Antoni, and Stephen Miller;
- Facts: crime is down. NYT Editorial Board explains why, with my comments about “defunding the police” actually means.
Beginning with two from Paul Krugman.
Paul Krugman, 13 Aug 2025: Hackification, subtitled “Arendt’s Law comes for economic data”
Hannah Arendt was a writer and political theorist famous for works on totalitarianism. She’s noted for the phrase “the banality of evil.”
Krugman begins:
On Monday I wrote about Donald Trump’s disastrous press conference touting the economy along with Stephen Moore, a former chief economist at the Heritage Foundation. As I noted, Moore is a dishonest partisan hack, which is only to be expected, but also bizarrely incompetent, incapable of ever getting his facts right. To explain the phenomenon, I invoked Hannah Arendt:
Totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with those crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty.
Let me call this Arendt’s Law: Totalitarian and wannabe totalitarian regimes only hire incompetent hacks.
The balance of the post discusses E.J. Antoni, whom Trump has nominated to head the Bureau of Labor Statistics, to replace for former head, whom he fired because he didn’t like the job numbers she reported a week ago. One of the first things he’s said since the nomination is
that the BLS should stop issuing monthly jobs reports until the “problems” at the agency are fixed.
I guess that would be one way to let Trump continue claiming that the economy is booming — just stop publishing the data showing that it isn’t.
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Then today. Most people *always* think the economy is bad. It’s negativity bias — we’re tuned to be more aware of bad news than good. And most people aren’t persuaded by statistics.
Paul Krugman, 14 Aug 2025: MAGA’s Feelings Don’t Care About Your Facts, subtitled “Reality is what Trump says it is”
Just under two weeks ago the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a sharp slowdown in job growth — consistent with independent surveys that also show a slowing economy. Donald Trump responded by firing the Bureau’s head and wants to replace her with an unqualified right-wing hack — let’s be honest, OK? — whose big idea for dealing with troubling job numbers is to stop releasing them.
This week Trump seized control of the Washington DC police force and sent in the National Guard to deal with what he claims is a runaway crime wave, even though crime in the District has been falling rapidly.
What these two stories have in common is this: MAGA’s feelings don’t care about your facts. And the rejection of data Trump doesn’t like will surely extend to many areas beyond jobs and crime.
And then:
About jobs: E.J. Antoni, Trump’s pick for BLS Commissioner, has actually said that we should define a recession not on the basis of things like employment data or GDP but by how people “feel.” Now, that criterion wouldn’t serve him or his master very well if we look at surveys of public opinion. The American people appear to feel really bad about the economy.
Indicating the chart shown above.
(Aside: I recall the phrase “on account of the economy,” from a Springsteen song, as discussed here, by writers who also mention that Springsteen is a “flaming liberal.”)
Given that most people always think the economy is bad, how would Trump convince them that he’s improved it? Why, by simply telling them he has. Because he doesn’t care about actual data. He quotes Stephen Miller:
Crime stats in big blue cities are fake. The real rates of crime, chaos & dysfunction are orders of magnitude higher.
Everyone who lives in these areas knows this. …
No, we don’t; no, they aren’t; Miller is delusional or a liar, just like Trump is. Krugman reacts:
May I say that to anyone who pays the slightest amount of attention to New York politics, the idea that the NYPD is rigging the crime data to make liberal mayors look good is simply hilarious.
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Trump makes the same nonsensical claim, without evidence.
JMG, 14 Aug 2025: Trump: DC’s Crime Rate Is Ten Times What Is Reported
Which is more likely? That thousands of police officers and statisticians are manipulating the data, or that Trump, the inveterate liar, asserts whatever it is he wishes to be true?
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But, as I’ve suggested, conservative fantasies eventually hit reality. Videos help.
Daily Kos, 13 Aug 2025: Trump’s delusional DC crime fantasy is falling apart
Video of armed federal officers meandering around Washington, D.C., on Tuesday night is once again refuting President Donald Trump’s lie that the nation’s capital is facing a surge of violent crime.
The viral video, posted online by Freedom News TV, shows armed agents of the FBI and Drug Enforcement Agency, dressed in uniform, walking around the Georgetown area of the city. They walk down mostly empty streets and sidewalks, doing nothing. They walk past quiet patrons eating at a sidewalk cafe. Onlookers gawk at them in surprise.
“Not much going on here, so maybe they’re practicing,” a civilian tells the camera crew.
The article includes the video.
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There is a real reality, and it can be measured and counted. Not perfectly, perhaps, but in ways that are more effective and productive than relying on “feelings,” or reliance on myths. That’s the history of humanity over the past few hundred years.
NY Times, Editorial Board, 14 Aug 2025: Crime Keeps Falling. Here’s Why. [gift link]
America is in the midst of a historic decline in crime. In 2023, murders fell 10 percent, which was then the largest annual drop since reliable records began in 1960. Last year, the country very likely set another record, with a 15 percent drop. This year, murders are on track to set yet another record, having fallen about 20 percent in major cities. Shootings, robberies and thefts have also plummeted.
These declines have erased the spike in crime that occurred during and after the Covid-19 pandemic. Indeed, the murder rate in 2025 could end up being lower than it has been at any other point in at least 65 years. In terms of violent crime, modern America may be safer than it has been in decades, based on data collected by the crime analyst Jeff Asher.
Pointing to the chart displayed above.
Crime is down in Washington, D.C., too, contrary to President Trump’s claims this week that it is a hotbed of violence. Although the city’s murder rate remains far too high, it is now comparable to what it was before the pandemic.
The editors go on with two lessons.
The first lesson is the importance of public trust and stability.
The pandemic; George Floyd’s murder; a loosening of behavioral norms.
During the pandemic, reckless driving, deaths from car crashes and road rage incidents increased. Alcohol and drug deaths also rose. Even little things, like people using phones in movie theaters, seemed to worsen even after Covid receded. It was as if many Americans took a so-called moral holiday.
But in the aftermath, people are returning to normal; thus crime has fallen.
The second lesson involves the importance of law enforcement.
During the 2020 protests, many progressives embraced calls to “defund the police,” and some prominent Democrats — including then-Senator Kamala Harris of California, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and then-Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles — supported the defund movement. But police funding did not decline much, if at all, in most cities.
Now, perhaps I am misunderstanding this after all these years, but the “defund the police” movement wasn’t driven by any idea of letting crime run rampant — who would want that? — but by the notion that police departments were given so much money — because conservatives always want to the give the military and police more money, since they are frightened — that police departments were buying up used military equipment, tanks and whatnot, and turning small and large cities into war zones. There was no reason local police should need military equipment. And that’s why some wanted police budgets cut. Defunded.
Moving on, the piece makes one more point.
It is worth mentioning one factor that has played little role in the recent crime decline, contrary to claims from Mr. Trump. He has suggested that the crime spike was the fault of illegal immigration during the Biden administration and that the reversal stems from his border crackdown. That appears to be simply false. Immigrants, including those who entered the country illegally, commit crimes at lower rates than native-born Americans (in part because of the potential consequences, including deportation).
Again, conservatives don’t believe statistics, but the statistics indicate that immigrants, whether legal or illegal, commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans, precisely for that reason: they’re afraid that if they commit a crime, they’ll be caught, and deported. Once immigrants make their way here, most are on their best behavior.
Much more in this very intelligent editorial. I’ll make it a gift link.
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But there will always be *some* crime, and this will alarm conservatives, who are easily panicked, and who always seem to vote for draconian measures in order to control it.
