When the government shuts down, its statisticians stop going to work. Mark Schiefelbein/AP New York —

The economic warning lights are all going off.

Giant tariffs are up in the air, once again. No official economic data will come out during the government shutdown. And once the business of the US government does resume, it’s anyone’s guess who the president will tap to run the Bureau of Labor Statistics now that the administration has been forced to claw back its disastrous first pick.

Let’s step back on the off-chance that the reliability of government statistics wasn’t your top priority this week…

In normal times, when the US government is functioning, we the people are entitled to a steady stream of reports that allow us to take the temperature of the US economy. In these n

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