Photograph Source: SWinxy – CC BY 4.0

The Republicans have been so successful at hyping the fraud around the Feeding Our Future child nutrition program in Minnesota that even liberal Democrats reflexively all say “fraud” when they discuss Minnesota. Apparently, it is news to even well-informed types that Trump and his sycophants lie about liberal politicians, especially successful ones like Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.

Rather than wallow in contrition over the fraud that took place, it would be worth spending more time in Reality Land. No one should ever apologize for fraud. It is a serious crime, especially when the money was designated for a nutrition program designed to help children from low- and moderate-income families.

But we need a sense of proportion. Fraud in government programs will never be zero. As with the private sector (can you say Enron?), people will try to cheat. And they do a lot of cheating on their taxes, ripping us off to the tune of more than $600 billion a year, according to the I.R.S.

How much did the bad guys in Minnesota (yeah, some were Somali immigrants – really bad) steal from us? The best figure I could find puts it at around $250........

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