Top economic adviser defends the firing without defending the firing.

The President’s top economic adviser went on Meet the Press on Sunday to explain why the President fired the woman who counts the jobs. He said the country needs “a fresh set of eyes” at the Bureau of Labor Statistics. He said it three different times. He never said what the eyes were supposed to find.

Hon. Fresh eyes is a thing your manager says when she does not know what the answer is yet but she’d like the meeting to feel productive.

The original claim, the one the President posted to his social network on Friday, was that the BLS commissioner faked the numbers to help the previous administration win an election that already happened. That is a specific accusation. It can be checked. There is a chain of custody on the data. Career economists put the report together over weeks. The commissioner sees it shortly before it goes out the door.

The Sunday show was a chance to show the receipts. There were no receipts.

This is the part where you notice the trick. You make a serious accusation on Friday at full volume. You spend the weekend on television lowering the temperature. By Monday the original sentence is gone. What’s left is a vague shrug about “revisions” and “fresh eyes” and the country has agreed, on no particular grounds, that the numbers are now suspicious.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has been measuring American employment since 1884. They know what they’re doing. The fresh set of eyes is not the problem.

You ever notice how the people who use the word “rigged” the most are also the ones who never want to show you the wiring.

That ought to concern you.