On the Road: Along the Rio Grande, Students Struggle to Surmount Poverty

A salutary aspect of life on the campaign trail, even in the bubble that is a candidate’s lot, is that one is reminded from time to time of the prosaic, not to mention heart-breaking, struggle of so many to escape poverty’s grasp.
On The Road – The Caucus – Politics – New York Times Blog

So the Barack Obama campaign rolled into the flat emerald eastern edge of the Rio Grande Valley, which is the heart of Clinton country and, by the by, one of the poorer places in the United States. Here in this humid land, amid palm groves and orange trees, an overwhelmingly – about 90 percent – Latino population lives perched on precarious economic ledge. The median family income is about $31,000 and one-third of the residents have no health insurance.

The morning event was at the University of Texas-Pan American and one hastens to add that it was “staged,” in that the candidate wanted to televise his empathy for the plight of these students and to draw attention to his proposal for a big tuition tax credit in exchange for community service. Both Mr. Obama and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton have hit these themes as they traverse this valley where so many are so destitute.”*

*From: thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

Leave a Reply