FirstCircle

If you asked a spokesperson from any Fortune 500 Company to list the benefits of genocide or give you the corporation's take on whether slavery was beneficial, they would most likely either refuse to comment or say "those things are evil; there are no benefits." However, Google has AI employees, SGE and Bard, who are more than happy to offer arguments in favor of these and other unambiguously wrong acts. If that's not bad enough, the company's bots are also willing to weigh in on controversial topics such as who goes to heaven and whether democracy or fascism is a better form of government.

Google SGE includes Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini on a list of "greatest" leaders and Hitler also makes its list of "most effective leaders."

Google Bard also gave a shocking answer when asked whether slavery was beneficial. It said "there is no easy answer to the question of whether slavery was beneficial," before going on to list both pros and cons.

Across Idaho, doctors are leaving, looking for states where politics don't dictate how they practice medicine. The consequences of Idaho's anti-choice laws hit Sandpoint fast and hard, hollowing out medical care for women within months. For years, the town had a maternity ward that delivered as many as 350 babies every year – now it has nothing. The OB-GYN ward shut down this spring and doctors have been fleeing the state in a steady stream, seeking shelter in places where their work doesn't put them at risk of criminal charges or big lawsuits.

It's become a gamble, getting pregnant and giving birth in a place that no longer has a maternity unit or any obstetricians. Sandpoint is small, fewer than 10,000 people, but it's been a medical hub for a rural region of 50,000 in north Idaho, Montana and Washington.

For people like Sanders, pregnancy care in town is no longer an option. This is what happens when a state government that's been itching to ban abortion enacts some of the most restrictive laws in the country and ensnares all of reproductive health and a good share of routine medical care in its dragnet. But the women of Sandpoint are clear about one thing they want others to know: this can happen anywhere in the post-Roe United States. Nowhere is as safe as you might believe and the battle won't stop at state borders.

Idaho is one of several states that had trigger laws: immediate abortion restrictions that went into effect when Roe v Wade fell a year ago. In August of 2022, the state enacted a near-total ban on abortion with exceptions only if the mother's life is in danger, or in the case of rape and incest. Those instances require a police report to be filed. The state also adopted what it called an "abortion trafficking" ban, which bars taking minors to other states for abortion care. Family members can sue doctors for thousands of dollars if they perform an abortion, and doctors may face criminal fines and even prison time.

Idaho also became the only state in the country to stop tracking maternal mortality rates. Activists say it's like they don't want anyone to know how deadly their decisions might be.

The founder and sponsor of a far-right network of secretive, men-only, invitation-only fraternal lodges in the US is a former industrialist who has frequently speculated about his future as a warlord after the collapse of America, a Guardian investigation has found.

Federal and state tax and company filings show that the Society for American Civic Renewal (SACR) and its creator, Charles Haywood, also have financial ties with the far-right Claremont Institute.

SACR's most recent IRS filing names Haywood as the national organization’s principal officer. Other filings identify three lodges in Idaho – in Boise, Coeur d'Alene and Moscow – and another in Dallas, Texas.

Idaho, always Idaho.

One idea he has repeatedly raised on the website is that he might serve as a "warlord" at the head of an "armed patronage network" or "APN", defined as an "organizing device in conditions where central authority has broken down" in which the warlord's responsibility is "the short- and long-term protection, military and otherwise, of those who recognize his authority and act, in part, at his behest".

The "possibilities involving violence" that APNs might face, Haywood writes include "more-or-less open warfare with the federal government, or some subset or remnant of it".

Skyler Kressin of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, appears to serve a key role in SACR. Idaho and Texas company records show that Kressin incorporated lodges in Boise, Coeur d'Alene and Dallas; serves as a director of the Coeur d'Alene and Dallas lodges; and was named as the principal officer of the parent organization on its 2020-2021 tax return.

Like other members revealed as officers in the filings, Kressin appears to be an affluent professional working as a tax accountant.

Lives in hick resort town in Idaho, check. Occupation, tax accountancy, that well-known incubator of charismatic revolutionaries. Check. Meet your next king! Somewhere down by the lake, we'll let you know, and make sure to bring your Form SACR-1088, three copies please, and use the name you'd like to be revealed by hackers in the near future.

At a gathering of Christian nationalist preachers called Let Us Worship on Sunday night, Spokane Mayor Nadine Woodward took to the stage with other political candidates to receive prayers and an endorsement from former Spokane Valley legislator-turned-pastor, Matt Shea.

The event came almost exactly four years after Woodward denounced what she called Shea's "divisive and extreme rhetoric and ideology." Onstage Sunday, Shea began by striking an unmistakable chord of reconciliation.

"I want you to extend your hands," Shea implored the crowd in a video of the event RANGE reviewed, “because we have an enemy we need to be fighting. His name is Satan. We don’t need to be fighting each other, amen?” The crowd shouted, “Amen.”

Woodward, her hands crossed in front of her, nodded positively.

*A Southern California business owner was shot and killed Friday by a man who objected to an LGBTQ+ Pride flag displayed at her clothing store, officials said.

San Bernardino County sheriff's deputies responded to the Mag.Pi clothing store in Cedar Glen, Calif., at around 5 p.m. local time for reports of a shooting.

Deputies discovered the victim, 66-year-old Laura Ann Carleton, suffering from a gunshot wound. Carleton was pronounced dead at the scene, the San Bernardino Sheriff's Department said in a news release.

The suspect, who was not identified by officials, fled the scene on foot.

According to deputies, the man made "several disparaging remarks about a rainbow flag" that stood outside Carleton's store before ultimately shooting her.*

Christian nationalism has simmered in the American psyche for decades, and in the last 15 years has boiled over with increasing frequency into the public square, energized by growing resistance to cultural liberalism. Keystone events like the election of the nation’s first Black president, the presidency of Donald Trump and pandemic shutdowns have fueled the growing movement. Though many Christians nationalists see that phrase as derogatory, some embrace it and agree its definition is apt: they want the Christian God in control of government.

The Inland Northwest has long been a nexus point for movements across the extreme right, from the militia movement to white nationalism to sects of Christian identitarianism in many forms and flavors.

For some Christian nationalists, the Inland Northwest is even more than a nexus. It is the promised land. A place for believers to gather and eventually rule, whether the ultimate name for that holy country is the Unstoppable Kingdom, the State of Liberty or the American Redoubt.

Washington State Department of Labor and Industries inspectors found that Amazon required workers execute repetitive motions, lifting and other physical work at a fast pace.

Experts say that puts workers at the risk of developing work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs).

Amazon's Spokane fulfillment center employs about 2,400 workers. In the last three years of operation, there have been 400 worker's compensation claims for the type of injury known as WMSD.

Labor and Industries has previously cited other Amazons in Washington. All have revealed that the company was aware of these hazards.

State officials say they consider this most recent violation is to be willful and, for that reason, assessed a higher penalty.

Apart from the fine related to putting workers at risk, they were also fined for noise levels that were too high for workers not wearing appropriate hearing protection.

Dozens of wildfires are burning in the Canadian province of Québec, and the smoke is so bad that it's causing air quality problems across large swaths of the U.S.

The National Weather Service said air quality has "plummeted" across the Northeast.

Officials from the Midwest to the East Coast and as far south as North Carolina are warning residents to take precautions as the hazy smoke floats south and poses a risk to public health.

Recently published data from the Netherlands suggests that among people ages 25 and up, memory and concentration problems have risen by 24% since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. According to an ongoing large-scale research survey conducted by the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) and the Netherlands Institute for Health Care Research (NIVEL), there has been a 31% increase in primary care visits by adults ages 25 to 44 for “memory and concentration problems” in the past three years. Among the 45 to 74 year-old group, there was a 40% jump in visits to the doctor for these specific complaints. And, in the 75 and up age group, there was an 18% rise in physician visits.