Cottonwood Falls, in the heart of Kansas, is a small town surrounded by prairie as far as the eye can see and dotted with idyllic farms and red barns. This ranching community of roughly 850 people proudly hosts a tiny museum whose centerpiece is a perfectly preserved settlers’ wagon. Next to it is the “House of God,” a café that also functions as a church, or vice versa. The cobblestone main street features at one end a hotel where what may once have been a saloon is now a bar. At the other end stands a startling stone building in French Renaissance style: one of the oldest courthouses still in operation west of the Mississippi River. Currently, it also serves as an early voting polling place for next Tuesday’s midterm elections.
© Charlie Riedel (Charlie Riedel/AP via AP)
© Clayton Steward for The New York Times
© The New York Times
The main investigative unit of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been vigorously promoting on social media an effort it considers crucial in the final weeks before the midterms: pursuing alleged large-scale election fraud by noncitizens — a claim that has obsessed President Donald Trump despite a lack of evidence.
© HSI Kansas City
Charisma or cash: to win an election, candidates need at least one of those two factors. With two weeks to go until the U.S. midterm elections, Republicans are throwing everything they have into the closest states to try to climb back in polls that are unfavorable to them. They have the invaluable help of the vast sums Donald Trump raises through his Super PAC, the political action committee that pools donations coming from the ultraconservative MAGA movement.
© Alex Brandon (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
© Pool photo by Charlie Riedel
President at Kansas rally tries to turn protests into cautionary tale for US as Republicans face midterm losses
As Republicans confront mounting political headwinds ahead of November’s midterm elections, Donald Trump is attempting to turn unrest in France into a cautionary tale for American voters, recasting the demonstrations that began as student protests against crumbling schools and the soaring cost of living as evidence of the dangers of immigration and the erosion of western civilization.
At a rally in Kansas on Monday evening, Trump described France as a once-great nation that had been “conquered, looted, and burned to the ground by migrants, jihadists, and communists”.
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© Photograph: Kent Nishimura/AFP/Getty Images
© Photograph: Kent Nishimura/AFP/Getty Images
© Photograph: Kent Nishimura/AFP/Getty Images
Selden is a town of fewer than 200 inhabitants on the banks of Interstate 83, which runs north–south from North Dakota to Texas as it passes through Kansas. The town is surrounded by wheat and corn fields that look as if they were drawn with a ruler, and circular wheat and corn fields that look as if they were drawn with a compass. In other words, Selden is an almost indistinguishable point in the geographic center of the United States — a vast tapestry of gold, brown, or green depending on the time of year — so flat that the horizon is everywhere.
© EPV
The U.S. midterm elections will not only determine who will occupy the Congressional seats and governorships up for grabs in November. In several states, voters will also find ballot measures seeking to amend laws, approve tax changes, or add new provisions to state constitutions.
© Ryan Murphy (AP Photo/Ryan Murphy)
Northwest Arkansas has been changing. Walmart, which has been rooted in Bentonville for more than 75 years, has reshaped the small town, and now that growth is spreading into the surrounding countryside. With that change, writes Jordan P. Hickey in this poignant essay, come wealthy newcomers looking for a country lifestyle and gravel cyclists riding thousands of unpaved rural roads. And then there are the dogs—who have been here longer than any of these transplants—caught in the midst of it all. Hickey calls them “yarddogs,” finding in them a metaphor for a region in the process of transformation. (Subscription required.)
Downtown Bentonville, so carefully planned, feels surreal today—”Disneyfied,” “Pleasantville,” “gentrification” are the apt words of the critics.And not that it needs to be said, but there are no yarddogs in Bentonville. Not anymore. Here, there are only good dogs. Dogs on leashes, dogs that have been to school, dogs that listen, obey, behave, and will not lunge at every passing jogger.
But, of course, this is not really about dogs at all.
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