The World and Everything in It: August 4, 2025

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MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning!

Religious liberty in school, in public, and on the job requires vigilance:

SHACKELFORD: They put it in writing that she was fired for using the wrong pronouns.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: That and other religious liberty battles ahead on Legal Docket.

Also the Monday Moneybeat with David Bahnsen.

And a New York edition of the WORLD History Book…including a flight attendant who quit his job without thinking it through.

SLATER: I’d had it. I was absolutely done at that moment.

REICHARD: It’s Monday, August 4th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

MAST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. Good morning!

REICHARD: Time for news. Here’s Mark Mellinger.

MARK MELLINGER, NEWS ANCHOR: WH defends Trump’s firing of BLS director » White House Cabinet members are defending President Trump’s firing of the Bureau of Labor Statistics director.

Trump terminated Erika McEntarfer Friday after the bureau’s most recent jobs report came in lower than expected, and job gains from the previous two months were revised down hundreds of thousands.

Trump claims the jobs reports were rigged to make him look bad.White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett is backing the president’s decision, claiming the numbers didn’t make sense.

HASSETT: When I first saw the big revisions -which by the way were the largest revisions going all the way back for 50 years if we exclude the COVID years- when I saw those revisions, I thought it must be a typo. I’ve never seen a revision like this.

Democratic California Senator Alex Padilla tells NBC’s Meet the Press the bureau is just one of many government agencies Trump is weaponizing.

PADILLA: When he’s trying to weaponize the Bureau of Labor Statistics, that tells you a lot about their insecurity about the economy.

White House Trade Representative Jamieson Greer says the president is the president and has the right to choose who works in the executive branch. Trump says the next person appointed to the job will be “competent and qualified.”

Senate adjourns without votes on Trump nominees » Senators are headed home for their August recess without a deal to approve several of President Trump’s appointees to key posts.

Negotiations broke down over the weekend. In order to clear the way for the nominees’ approval, Democrats wanted the GOP to unfreeze funding for causes like foreign aid and the National Institutes of Health.

Republican Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin tells Fox News:

MULLIN: We started at $800 million dollars for pet projects for Schumer. And then they kept raising the number, to $1.3 billion. And a lot of this had to do with money going to Gaza, which, keep in mind, Hamas hasn’t even released the hostages.

Mullin, referring to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

The president thought Schumer’s demands were going too far and encouraged senators to reject them, calling them political extortion. Schumer accused Trump of pulling the plug on negotiations.

TX Dems walk out to prevent redistricting vote » State Democratic lawmakers in Texas left their state Sunday, hoping to block a Republican effort to draw new boundary lines for congressional districts aimed at helping secure an additional handful of seats for the GOP.

The legislature is convening for the rare mid-decade redistricting at President Trump’s request, and GOP leaders are hoping to vote on the new maps today.

But to conduct official business, at least 100 of the 150 members of the Texas House must be present, and a Democratic spokesman says at least 51 lawmakers have walked out.

Former Obama Administration Attorney General Eric Holder tells ABC’s This Week:

HOLDER: This is an authoritarian move by the White House to try to make sure that they can rig the midterm elections in 2026. And so I think that a Democratic response that is responsive, that is responsible, and that is temporary, is appropriate given these facts.

The walkout could expose Democratic lawmakers to fines and other penalties. Texas’s attorney general has even threatened arrest, but legislative walkouts are civil violations, so lawmakers couldn’t legally face jail time.

Israeli minister fuels fury for praying at holy site » An Israeli national security minister widely considered an extremist sparked outrage Sunday, leading a prayer at Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site.

Itamar Ben-Gvir prayed at the Al Aqsa Mosque compound in the complex known in Judaism as the Temple Mount. A decades-old agreement bars Jews from worshiping there. Anyone can visit, but only Muslims are allowed to pray.

Ben-Gvir was there on a yearly day of mourning in Judaism, calling for Israel to conquer Gaza. Jordan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Palestinian leaders all condemned the prayers.

In the past, Ben-Gvir has been convicted of supporting terrorist groups and inciting anti-Arab racism in Israel.

Gaza: New hostage photos spark outrage » Also in Israel, tens of thousands of protestors converged on Tel Aviv over the weekend, furious over new Hamas propaganda videos showing two emaciated Israeli hostages.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is now accusing Hamas of not wanting a ceasefire. He’s also asking the International Red Cross to bring food and medical care to the hostages in Gaza.

Hamas says it won’t put down its weapons until a Palestinian state is recognized. Israeli U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon says his country won’t stop fighting, either.

DANON: They believe that because of the international pressure and the lies they spread, they can get whatever they want. But they are mistaken. We will not leave the hostages behind.

At least 50 hostages, both alive and dead, are still believed to be in Hamas custody.

Trump repositions nuclear subs to up pressure on Russia » President Trump is repositioning two nuclear submarines amid increasing tension with Russia.

Trump didn’t give specifics but says moving the subs is a response to a recent threat from Russian security official and former president Dmitry Medvedev, who called a recent ultimatum from Trump “a step toward war.”

Trump says Russia has until Friday to secure a ceasefire with Ukraine or face increased economic sanctions. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller:

MILLER: All options are on the table to deal diplomatically, financially, and otherwise with the ongoing war in Ukraine so we can achieve peace.

Miller, talking to Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo.

Trump has also told Medvedev to “watch his words.”

I’m Mark Mellinger.

Straight ahead: previewing a handful of religious freedom cases on Legal Docket. Plus, David Bahnsen untangles US tariff policy on the Monday Moneybeat.

This is The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s The World and Everything in It for this 4th day of August, 2025. We’re so glad you’ve joined us today. Good morning! I’m Lindsey Mast.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. It’s time for Legal Docket.

That music you hear is singer Colton Dixon’s hit song on the Christian music charts, Up and Up. Earlier this year, it was briefly at the center of a controversy in an elementary school in Michigan

MAST: Back in May, a couple of students wanted to perform Christian tunes for the talent show. One was Dixon’s song. But school administrators refused, arguing the songs were too “Christian based” for a public-school setting.

REICHARD: Word got out and eventually Colton Dixon himself got wind of it through a video on social media. So he also posted about it himself:

DIXON: So whoever the student was, first of all, thanks for choosing my song. I think that is us…What an honor. You know, I wanted to be tagged in the video. But apparently the school came back and said that they couldn't do it because it was too overtly Christian and that not everyone believed in God. We actually have the freedom and the right to do this, to worship freely… Kudos to you guys.

Parents stepped up and called a nonprofit law firm that defends religious liberty, First Liberty institute. In this case, all it took was a letter to the school to change things. The students sang their songs. Happy ending.

MAST: Of course, not all defenders of religious liberty find such an easy resolution. Take Jocelyn Boden of Utah. She was a store manager for Bath and Body Works for more than three years. In March, she hired a person who soon informed Boden she was transgender and wanted to go by a different name. Boden didn’t have a problem with that part, as she told her lawyers:

BODEN: I didn't mind calling this new associate by her preferred nickname. I just — in my own personal beliefs — did not agree with falsifying my speech or being coerced to speak in a way that went against my religious and moral convictions by calling her ‘him.’

When Boden said she couldn’t use male pronouns for a woman, HR got involved and soon Boden was fired. Her lawyer says the company failed to follow its own discipline policy and went straight to firing her.

REICHARD: I did ask Bath and Body Works for comment on this story, but I didn’t hear back in time.

So for now, this case is in the hands of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission—or EEOC. That’s the required first step prior to filing a lawsuit of this sort in federal court.

MAST: First Liberty’s President and Chief Counsel Kelly Shackelford says it’s a strong case, one needed to clarify previous case law:

SHACKELFORD: They put it in writing — that she was fired for using the wrong pronouns. And this is a great test of something that we just won at the Supreme Court a few years ago. I think it's a perfect case, because a lot of times what happens in the workplace is people will not say why they're really doing what they're doing. You know, they'll say, well, they won't say, Well, I don't like the Christians and I'm firing this person. Or I don't like the Jewish guy who has different beliefs than we do on let's say he's Orthodox Jews, and he has a Sabbath on a Friday night to a Saturday night that they don't say those things. A lot of times, they just do it. In this case, they said it.

REICHARD: The case he’s talking about is Groff v DeJoy from 2023. Gerald Groff asked that he not have to work on Sundays for religious reasons. Even though the USPS made accommodations for him at first, eventually that changed and Groff felt he had no choice but to resign. Then he sued for discrimination.

MAST: And he won at the Supreme Court, 9 to 0. That raised the standard for when employers can deny someone a religious accommodation.

SHACKELFORD: And so it mean now, people do have protections in the workplace. Well, here’s the first really major test case. You're hearing about these all over people losing their jobs, not because they're not doing well or they're not doing what they're supposed to do, but because there's some sort of pronoun policy.

So now the EEOC will decide whether to pursue the case on Boden’s behalf, or give her a right-to-sue letter so she can move ahead on her own.

REICHARD: Another case involves free speech along with a criminal charge. Gabriel Olivier is a Christian evangelist who preached in a public park in Brandon, Mississippi.

SHACKELFORD: So the city actually passed a law that you could only go into one little part of the park, which they called the protest area, (laughs) like sharing the gospel is a protest, and, and, and if you go out of it, you get fined. And so well, Gabe went to try to be obedient. He went in the area, but he's like, Oh, I can't talk to anybody. And that's kind of the whole purpose is to be able to share with people. And so he walked out of the free speech area, of the protest area, and they fined him. They issued him a criminal citation.

Olivier went ahead and paid the fine, intending to challenge the law in court. And that’s when things got more complicated. Supreme Court precedent says a person with a criminal conviction cannot challenge it in civil court unless its been reversed or overturned. But that creates a Catch-22 for Olivier. He couldn’t sue before the conviction, nor after it.

SHACKELFORD: It's sort of this anomaly of, you know, of the weird situation that some of the judges are interpreting this Supreme Court case.

And so you'd think that would be kind of obvious, that everybody has their right to the day in court, especially free speech in a public park, right?

MAST: So the justices will hear Olivier’s case next term. It’ll be the first major religious speech of this kind in years.

REICHARD: Finally, back west to California. Tarin Swain this past spring attended a Ventura County city council meeting.

Her daughter had been socially transitioned at school, affirming the child’s identity as the opposite sex. Swain wanted to address that with policy arguments to the council.

But she was 84th in a line of 130 people queued up to speak and by the time it was her turn to speak, Swain felt moved to pray:

SWAIN: Hi, I’m Tarin Swain. I’m a mother of six and the Ventura County Public School socially transitioned my daughter without my consent. I’ve come here today to offer nothing but prayer and I want to lift up my Father in heaven. Father, God, I just come to you in Jesus name. (booing)

MAST: The crowd got loud and antagonistic and before she could finish, the mayor cut her off.

MAYOR: (gaveling) Stop the time. I pray that you would raise up the time. Everybody on this, everybody, stop, yep, stop, stop. Shhh. Thank you. We don't do prayer.

REICHARD: Swain kept going. I talked to her on Friday and asked how she found the nerve to keep going:

SWAIN: You messed with my kid and on top of that… I’ve lived a life of disobedience in my life, and I saw where that path led. And so now, when God calls me to do something, I do it. And it really didn't matter what was going on. It was just noise at that moment….

Swain told me when she stood at the podium, she had a vision of darkness behind the council, with angelic beings and Christ present.

SWAIN: And it sounds wild, but it's just this picture I got in my head, and I felt like the Lord was like, I want you to speak as if I'm the only one you're speaking to.

MAST: Swain contacted First Liberty, and its lawyers sent a letter to the city council explaining her First Amendment rights. 

She was invited back at the very next city council meeting. This time, she was allowed to say her prayer, despite pushback:

SWAIN: Father God, I just again come to you in Jesus name. Lord, I just pray, Father, that you would Lord, please…

MAN: Audience,Madam Mayor. Madam Mayor. Audience, order. Order that she’s able to pray as long as it is tied to the issue. Correct., City Attorney? The public needs to allow the speaker to complete her comment. Mayor: Please respect the speaker at the podium until their time is up.

SWAIN: Father I just come to you and your son Jesus….

REICHARD: So those are a few religious liberty cases. Some solved with a courageous soul and a well-placed letter, others with a courageous soul willing to wind their way through the system. 

Kelly Shackelford thinks the tide is shifting:

SHACKELFORD: So it's just now that we've turned the corner, and you're seeing it both in legal actions and in the public arena, where people realize it is okay to speak the truth. You know the emperor has no clothes. You know, it’s ok to say it now.

And that’s this week’s Legal Docket!

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: The Monday Moneybeat.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Time now to talk business, markets, and the economy with financial analyst and adviser David Bahnsen. David heads up the wealth management firm The Bahnsen Group. He is here now. Good morning to you, David.

DAVID BAHNSEN: Good morning, Mary, Good to be with you.

REICHARD: The Wall Street Journal this week mapped out where the Trump administration’s tariff strategy currently stands: threats, carveouts, exemptions, and still more deadlines looming, with China, Mexico, and Canada, all in flux. Businesses complain that this uncertainty is making it difficult to plan.

David, you’ve long argued tariffs are an economic tax that drags on growth—and you made that point in your latest Dividend Café. With so many moving targets in this tariff policy, what should we expect in the weeks and months ahead?

BAHNSEN: It is continually uncertain because there are still other pieces that are out there, and even the impact of the policies that we now do have clarity on—some of the policies are more clear, but the impact from some of those policies remains a bit unclear. It is actually hard for me to remember a point in which there were so many balls in the air, if you will, around the state of the labor market, around the state of business investment, what the appetite for trade will be.

Small business activity is of particular concern to me, not only because I do think it is highly relevant to total economic growth and productivity, but because it is narrowly important to those small businesses who I think represent an underappreciated part of our economy and, candidly, have really not been a big concern in the new administration’s policy portfolio. I have been surprised that small business has sort of gotten the shaft so far.

I do believe that there will be a bit of a tug of war in an economic push-pull of forces. One of the things I expect to be beneficial is the pro-growth aspects of the new tax bill stimulating some element of capital investment—the 100% business expensing, bonus depreciation for putting new real estate into play for productive purpose. I think you are going to see some activity there. That will be good. But then it is in a bit of a tug of war with an additional expense, a tax, a cost out of the tariff element. The way all of this affects total global trade will affect demand in the economy, and that will affect how businesses respond. In the meantime, a lot of people will be looking at what it does to inflation and prices as well. I think there are six or seven things I said there, and some of them are connected to one another, but all of them have a certain independent characteristic to them as well.

REICHARD: The July jobs report was pretty rough: around 70,000 new jobs, not great, and big downward revisions to May and June cut earlier job gains by more than a quarter of a million. And, I know this one is near and dear to you, the labor-force participation rate fell to 62.2%, the lowest in a year. How much of this slowdown do you think comes from tariffs and trade uncertainty versus other factors in the labor market?

BAHNSEN: I will be the first to admit that some of this is very hard to say with certainty, but there are things you have to do as an economist around what your logical intuition would be. Even if correlation and causation are never exactly the same thing, it is extremely unlikely that we are sitting here running at about 35,000 jobs per month over the last several months—as bad a number as we have seen since COVID—and that it has no correlation at all to the tariff policies. I find that simply impossible to believe.

We have to see where things go in the months ahead. There is a bit more clarity now than there was when some of these jobs reports were coming out. But I do think, as a matter of narrative, that this is a very big deal—far bigger than the July report, where the revisions in May and June, because the administration sort of trafficked all summer off of the “Hey, we did all this tariff stuff in April, and look how good jobs were, the economy’s humming along.” And now to see that the jobs numbers were not just as good as thought, but actually atrocious, is really undermining of that narrative.

I am not sure that it spirals worse from here. I do not see GDP going into a negative print. But if we end up the year where we are now—that real GDP growth is right now 1.25% annualized—then that really puts us in a very precarious position: a very low, slow, nearly no growth in the economy. That would be very concerning all the while we are expecting corporate profits to keep doing all the lifting, and corporate profits surely cannot keep growing with 1% economic growth.

REICHARD: The second-quarter GDP report looked strong at first glance, 3% growth. The Wall Street Journal editorial page called it “the weirdest GDP report ever”—making the point that the gain came almost entirely from collapsing imports. Again, not my area of expertise, but I read that one component of GDP growth is exports minus imports, and with imports falling 30 percent, that net export figure was alone responsible for fully 5 percentage points of the GDP. So what do you make of this GDP report, and what does it tell you about the real state of the economy right now?

BAHNSEN: It was not a good report. Let me clarify, have a little fun for WORLD listeners. The net exports, which is the fourth ingredient in how they measure GDP—the reason why it is exports minus imports—is to avoid double counting imports. GDP is trying to measure gross domestic product, and the other two ingredients include consumption. Somebody has already consumed an import in the consumption number and production, the things that get produced that become part of that process. By subtracting out imports, it is just a way to avoid double counting.

The imports were skyrocketing in the first quarter in advance of tariffs—it is what we call front running. That had the mathematical effect of dramatically lowering GDP. People like me were saying on Moneybeat three months ago, yes, we technically contracted one quarter, by 0.5%, but the consumption and production numbers were high enough that it was not really a sustainable contraction.

What happened instead was the import number reversed, and all you did was trade one quarter for the other. It resulted in the annualized number of 3% in Q2, which sounds good, negative 0.5 in Q1, which sounds bad, and then averaging them together gets you an annualized growth of 1.25%, which is not good. The big swing in imports are one-time events that are related to uncertainty around tariff policy. They matter, but it is one of the reasons I am a supply-sider who really believes that business investment, production, drives what is going to happen with the rest of economic growth. The business investment side is clearly very muted right now, and the small business optimism that is a pretty good leading indicator to certain production is extremely muted.

Will getting clarity on trade deals help improve this even if there are certain parts of the trade deals that the markets or that businesses do not like, but just merely having clarity, will that help? I hope so. But there is no way around the fact that there is a higher tariff level than there was a year ago. Now it is true, it is much lower than the President had threatened. But that real-life number is a cost, and when we talk about it as money coming into us, it is money coming out from us. It is money being paid by our business community. They are all going to debate whether it pushes prices higher. I think there are some cases where prices may go higher and some cases where they will not. The real question is, does it push demand lower, does it push corporate profits lower, does it push total trade lower? Ultimately, if trade goes lower, that means there is less capital coming into the country, and that creates a vicious cycle where less capital will mean less productive activity. This is not something we are measuring next week or next quarter. This is a 6, 12, 18-month thing that has to play out if we are going to do it honestly.

REICHARD: David, I’m no economist, but I’ve heard of this thing called the Laffer Curve—and it makes sense to me. If tax rates are 0%, the government collects nothing. If tax rates are 100% and the government takes every penny, nobody works, and the government also collects nothing. So cutting very high tax rates can actually bring in more money because it gets people working and investing again. Makes perfect sense.

Since tariffs are basically a tax, is there anything like a “Laffer Curve” for tariffs? Is there a point where they can actually make sense, or are they just harmful to economic activity at any rate?

BAHNSEN: There is certainly a Laffer Curve where the knob is turned up and down for how the impact is relative to the revenue they generate versus the impact they have on productivity. In this case, we are talking about the impact they have on trade, which becomes an impact on productivity. But when we say, could they be a good thing, I assume that is because we are talking about it being a good thing to generate more revenue for the government. This is an additive tax. It is not being used to replace capital gains tax, taxes on capital. It is not being used to replace corporate income tax or personal income tax. So all it is, in total, is some level of money leaving the private sector to go to the governmental sector. We are already in an aggregate Laffer Curve whereby that number has already pushed to the unproductive, inefficient side. But I certainly agree that a micro Laffer Curve exists for tariffs, and higher tariff rates do more damage than lower ones. Where we are at 15 or 12, it is all higher than where it had been, and therefore is pushing the demand curve down and pushing economic productivity down.

REICHARD: All right, David Bahnsen is founder, managing partner, and chief investment officer at The Bahnsen Group. He writes regularly for WORLD Opinions, and at dividend-cafe.com. David, thank you so much. We’ll see you next week.

BAHNSEN: Thanks so much, Mary.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Monday, August 4th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. Up next, the WORLD History Book. Today, three stories from New York City. A flight attendant’s job tips him over the edge and a famous detective meets a deadly end.

REICHARD: But first, the cold case of the “missingest man in New York.”

Here’s WORLD’s Paul Butler.

PAUL BUTLER: We begin today on August 6th, 1930, New York State Supreme Court Justice Joseph Force Crater gets into a cab near Manhattan's Times Square. He’s never seen again.

JOHN TEFFT: The disappearance of Crater is huge. It's probably the equivalent of a Jimmy Hoffa or even Amelia Earhart.

Retired detective John Tefft is a Crater case enthusiast and was featured in a History Channel documentary on his disappearance.

So who was Joseph Crater? He was the son of Irish immigrants. His father owned a produce market and orchard. But Joseph had other aspirations: the law. He graduated from Columbia University in 1916. He began as a humble clerk but worked his way up to becoming a successful lawyer.

Crater met his wife Stella while in college. She was married at the time and he helped her get a divorce. The two tied the knot in 1917. Crater became well connected politically in New York City and caught the eye of Governor Franklin D Roosevelt, who appointed Crater to the state bench in 1930.

Crater was associated with the corrupt Tammany Hall and its political machine. Many believe Crater essentially paid for his position on the court. It was not his only scandal. He was often seen in public with women, not his wife.

JOHN TEFFT: And it's not uncommon for him to sometimes be gone for several days at a time with other women.

While vacationing with his wife in August 1930, he received a call from New York. When he hung up all he told Stella that he needed to return to “straighten a few guys out.” He promised to be back in Maine by her birthday the week following.

His clerk later told authorities that while Crater was in New York the judge destroyed documents, moved files from his office to his apartment, and made arrangements to withdraw $5,000 from his bank account.

Then on August 6th he ate a meal with a lawyer friend and a showgirl at one of his usual haunts. When he left dinner, he got into a cab and disappeared, though it wasn’t reported for days.

Many of his friends thought he’d returned to his vacation with his wife, she thought he was still taking care of business in New York when he didn’t return for her birthday Stella began making calls, but no one seemed that willing to talk. Historian Sami Jarroush from the same History Channel documentary:

SAMI JARROUSH: They honestly don't really know where he is, but they're just assuming that he's off with one of his girlfriends…

Eventually it got out that Judge Crater was missing. Some thought he fled the country with a mistress. Others believed it was foul play.

By September a dramatic manhunt began. City detectives fielded more than 16,000 tips from around the country and the world, all dead ends.

The disappearance and resulting investigation filled newspapers and became an international story, leading to a popular culture reference to “pulling a Crater”... synonymous for going AWOL.

Officials declared Crater legally dead on June 6th, 1939, and forty years later, the state closed Missing Persons File No. 13595. A letter unearthed in 2005 claimed that he had been killed by a cop and his cabby brother, then buried at the current site of the New York Aquarium. But no remains were ever found, and 90 years after his disappearance, his ultimate end remains a mystery.

Speaking of mysteries, next, the death of a famous detective on August 6th, 50 years ago. The New York Times bestowed a high honor by publishing his obituary on the front page.

NYT OBITUARY: At the end of his life, he was arthritic and had a bad heart. He was in a wheelchair often, and was carried from his bedroom to the public lounge at Styles Court, a nursing home in Essex, wearing a wig and false mustaches to mask the signs of age that offended his vanity.

Why was it such an honor? Well, he wasn’t actually a real detective.

NYT OBITUARY: His career, as chronicled in the novels of Dame Agatha Christie, his creator, was one of the most illustrious in fiction.

Poirot rose to fame as the dignified, charming protagonist of Christie’s crime novels. She hated him, saying his character was “insufferable.” But her devoted readers loved him. And when Christie announced she was killing him off, New York Times book critic Thomas Lask had to honor his memory.

Poirot died of a heart condition at the end of Christie’s detective novel Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case. And it was the first, and last, time the New York Times published an obit of a fictional character.

Finally, fifteen years ago, flight attendant Steven Slater quits his job in a fit of rage and literally takes the emergency exit. Audio from Daily Mail World.

DAILY MAIL WORLD: Outside his home in New York City, neighbors say he did what a lot of people think about doing … but don’t.

The August 9th JetBlue flight from Pittsburgh to New York City began like any other.

But it didn’t end like one.

Slater was onboard, a 20 year veteran of the skies. And he was a little tipsy during the trip. Audio from an ABC News interview with Slater.

SLATER: Truthfully, I will admit that it was one of those days that drove me to drink and I admit that I did have a little sip.

But Slater had more than just a sip. While the plane taxied to a terminal at the John F. Kennedy Airport, he claimed that a passenger tried to get out of her seat and grab her luggage in the overhead compartment. After Slater told her not to. She snapped at him, and her luggage fell, hitting Slater in the head.

So, he grabbed the microphone for the overhead PA system and started cursing at her.

SLATER: I was angry, I was in a little bit of a state of rage. I’d had it. I was absolutely done at that moment.

Slater swiped two cans of beer from the beverage cart, and pulled the lever for the inflatable emergency slide. Then he slid down, threw his uniform tie on the tarmac, walked calmly to his Jeep, and drove back to his house in Queens.

Slater became an overnight sensation. Many blue-collar Americans considered him a folk hero. And late night TV show hosts joked about his great escape, like Jimmy Kimmel.

JIMMY KIMMEL: If we all had an inflatable escape slide at our jobs, I bet 80% of us would escape like that.

And Jay Leno.

JAY LENO: Anybody out there looking for jobs, there’s an opening for flight attendant at JetBlue, that’s right!

Others criticized Slater’s behavior. JetBlue fired him, and he only narrowly avoided prison. Investigators determined his account of the tussle with a female passenger was false.

Slater later encouraged people not to praise his actions, and instead see them as a cautionary tale.

SLATER: Address your concerns, address your issues, work to the best of your ability to better your position … but keep it in check.

For WORLD, I’m Paul Butler with reporting from Emma Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Tomorrow: the federal government passes crypto currency legislation, prompting concern over conflicts of interest.

And, we’ll meet a man who just wanted to make friends and discovered an international mission field in his own backyard.

That and more tomorrow.

I’m Lindsay Mast.

MARY RECHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio.

WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

Jesus said: Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it. Verse 15 of Mark chapter 10.

Go now in grace and peace.

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