The era of defining crime deviancy down is over. That is the most important message to come out of President Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to Washington, D.C.
The late Democratic senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York coined the phrase “defining deviancy down” in 1993 to describe the normalizing of antisocial behavior in contemporary America. Levels of deviancy once regarded as unacceptable become the new norm, hardly worthy of attention.
Trump rejects that reflex. “I’m announcing a historic action to rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam and squalor and worse,” he said on Monday. “This is liberation day in D.C., and we’re going to take our capital back.”
About 100 to 200 National Guard soldiers will provide administrative and logistical support for local law enforcement at any given time. They might also station themselves at intersections to deter lawlessness passively through what is known as “command presence.” Additionally, Trump temporarily installed the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration to oversee the Metropolitan Police Department.
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