Yes, thanks for noting that. I did mean pushback, but used kickback for a more violent tone - like how a cranked motor can 'kick back' if cranked incorrectly, risking a broken bone. The idea was that the Trumpers will be surprised at the determination, defiance, and effectiveness of the bureaucratic protests if they continue with the game of trying to corrupt the statistical process.

I certainly wasn't thinking of kickback in the sense of monetary corruption, so thanks for the note about the phrasing being ambiguous. Substitute "aggressive pushback" for my "kickback" in my post [1], if you will.

i think you meant 'pushback' not 'kickback'

right?
JL

Whichever way they head, this is yet another exercise wherein Donald Trump and company endeavor to cook the numbers to suit their own narrative and obfuscate reality... the exact same reason Trump himself was convicted on every single one of the 34 felony counts wherein he ordered his staff and personal lawyer (Cohen) to report fraudulent numbers. Same fraud, different day.

This is an inconvenient fact in the way Trump tells the story, so he just changes reality around to suit his fantasy.

Known fraud artist who literally lies on paper repeatedly and for decades regarding things as basic as the square footage of his residence and found liable in a court of law (along with multiple family members) and currently owing the State of New York near half a billion dollars (currently on appeal) continues to lie about numbers. Literally the same BS on permanent repeat.

Just a suggestion Chris, to keep the firestorm, er, a stormin’ until September.

And I tend to agree with you, that a presidential hijacking of the governent's number-crunching function is much harder than just firing the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics - or the other similar statistical agencies. The bureaucrats at their desks are the ones who produce the data, and then revise and revise it again to reflect reality.

I read today, on another political commentary, the the United States' production of government statistics is the envy of the world, it is that good. Accurate, in-depth, honest, and not at all in debt to the politicians currently in office.

I would think the U.S. bureaucrats are aware of their global reputation as the world's best statistical reporters. I would guess they take pride in it, as they should. And I would guess, and agree with you, that when the toadies and flunkies that Trump will be appointing to the front offices of these agencies send down orders to revise and massage unfavorable data reports, in the direction that will please the Dear Leader, they will encounter kickback.

Either kickback in the form of leaks, or flat refusals to do it and 'I dare you to fire me and my entire department because we'll go public with it', or mass resignations at a scale that will make it impossible for the agencies to do their jobs in any way that convinces the business and international economic sectors that U.S. business statistics are meaningful, going forward.

I doubt Trump cares about any of this, but perhaps his manipulative staff will get the message. After all, within just a few weeks of unleashing ICE on the undocumented immigrant problem, Trump chickened out and told ICE to leave the meatpackers and stoop laborers on the farms alone, so as not to endanger America's food supply. Who got him to do that? I imagine it was his manipulative staff. He himself can barely talk at this point, much less process a rational but complicated argument about the economic conseuquences of barely being able to talk at this point.