The US murder rate is barely more than HALF what it was 80 years ago, Tom (and I suspect that a higher proportion of [alleged] murders are reported as such these days, though I cannot, of course, know this), So I can see that considering only ’64 – ’80 as being somewhat questionable.

What fact has been obscured?

The difference is my hypothesis has real world plausibility, while your hypothesis does not.

“Under [rational basis review]… [Barton is deemed to have a legitimate reason for stopping the chart at 1993] if the court [me in this analogy] can merely hypothesize [a rational basis for him doing so, even if its not the actual rationale Barton used.]”
except you actually haven’t ANSWERED THE QUESTION! Your “approach” to AJ’s question seems to be nothing more than a smoke screen to avoid answering it.

AJ: “If you are going to be consistent, you will have to agree that the charges by the plaintiff (Barton) fail.”
——
By analogy, a court has different standards of evidence for different kinds of cases.
The standard of presumed innocence, unless proved otherwise beyond a reasonable doubt, is used for criminal cases , but the standard for civil cases is to judge based on the preponderance of the evidence, even if a reasonable doubt exists.
Consistency requires the same protocol be used for the same kinds of cases, but not for different kinds of cases.
In the present case, accusations of unethical behavior were made such as, “misleads on purpose,” “truly dishonest,” and. “knows but doesn’t care.”
To me, that requires a different standard of evidence to be placed on the plaintiff than would statements by someone in support of a hypothesis or theory.