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2018 State of the Union (by The White House via Wikimedia Commons) "Our Lord has made us free by sending us a man like Adolf Hitler as a leader," said  Arnold Gustavs , pastor in the small northern German island of Hiddensee, in one of his sermons in the 1930s. " Heil Hitler ! we shout. And day after day millions of arms are raised for this salute, and millions of lips speak out these words ... We often read the word Heil ['salvation', 'hail '] in the Old and the New Testament: but salvation is always given by God. Therefore, when we say Heil Hitler !, we wish him God's salvation. This salute is actually a prayer, for we pray that God save this man, our Führer , that he protect and bless him, that he give him the helmet of salvation so that he may bravely carry on the struggle for the renewal of the German people."  Pastor Gustavs was only one of many church leaders in Nazi Germany who enthusiastically supported Hitler, and who port

(Image by kees torn (CSCL GLOBE) [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons On the latest episode of Last Week Tonight, comedian John Oliver made fun of Donald Trump's tariffs and mocked him for not understanding how free trade works.   Oliver noted that tariffs are paid by importers and typically passed along to US consumers, leading to higher prices. Tariffs could cost the US hundreds of thousands of jobs, Oliver argued.  Trade deficits "aren't actually always bad, and many economists believe, for very complex reasons involving savings rates and the dollar's special status as the world's reserve currency, that America's trade balance might be more or less where it should be," he said. Oliver argued that "the overwhelming consensus among economists is that trade between countries generally speaking can create jobs, lower costs, and be a net benefit to both nations."  But is John Oliver right? We shall argue that although Tr

Peter Strzok was fired on Friday after serving in the FBI for 21 years, his lawyer Aitan Goelman said in a statement. "The decision to fire Special Agent Strzok is not only a departure from typical Bureau practice, but also contradicts (FBI) Director (Christopher) Wray's testimony to Congress and his assurances that the FBI intended to follow its regular process in this and all personnel matters," Goelman stated. Republican legislators and right-wing media had accused Strzok of anti-Trump bias , yet failed to provide any evidence that his personal opinions had influenced the way he carried out his duties as FBI agent. Embed from Getty Images “Let me be clear, unequivocally and under oath, not once in my 26 years of defending my nation did my personal opinions impact any official action I took,”  Strzok said in his opening statement before a joint hearing of the House judiciary and oversight and government reform committees in July.  “I have the utmost