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Elections in Wisconsin’s Iron County have always been down-home affairs: an ad in the Iron County Miner newspaper, some leaflets dropped at the door, maybe a hand-painted yard sign.

This year, that’s changed. Determined to promote controversial mining projects — and to advance Gov. Scott Walker’s agenda — a group backed by the billionaire Koch brothers has waded into Tuesday’s competition for control of the Iron County Board.

With dubious “facts” and over-the-top charges, the Wisconsin chapter of Americans for Prosperity is pouring money into the county — where voter turnout in spring elections rarely tops 1,500 — for attack ads. Small-business owners, farmers and retirees who have asked sensible questions about the impact of major developments on pristine lakes, rivers, waterfalls and tourism are dismissed as “anti-mining radicals” who “just want to shut the mines down, no matter what.”

Iron County is debating whether to allow mining, not whether to shut mines down. And many of the candidates the Kochs and their allies are attacking have simply said they want to hear from all sides.

But those details don’t matter in the new world of Big Money politics ushered in by U.S. Supreme Court rulings that have cleared the way for billionaires and corporations to buy elections.