Saturday, August 06, 2005

The invisible people

In 1776, in America, being poor meant possible starvation. In 1932, in America, being poor meant maybe not being sure where your next meal was coming from. In 2005, in America, being poor means the cable bill is late and you had to settle for lawn seats instead of reserved at the Mellencamp concert.

But there's still plenty of real poverty to go around and enough war, repression and drought to create more if we run short. Check out Medecins Sans Frontieres' special report on The 10 Most Underreported Humanitarian Crises of 2004 if you doubt it.

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St. Louis. Sh-t. I'm still only in St. Louis. Every time I think I'm going to wake up back in DC. When I was home after my first presidential election cycle, it was worse. I'd wake up and there'd be nothing ... I hardly said a word to my wife until I said yes to another campaign. When I was here I wanted to be there. When I was there, all I could think of was getting back inside the Beltway. I've been here a week now. Waiting for a campaign, getting softer. Every minute I stay in this room I get weaker. And every minute Dubya squats in the Oval Office he gets stronger. Each time I looked around the walls moved in a little tighter. Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a campaign, and for my sins they gave me one. Brought it up to me like room service.

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It's going to be a long day, folks. We've just got to hold it together until the bourbon and ether arrive. Or at least the pizza and hot wings. Those will work nicely, thank you very much.

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This half hour's Blogathon recommendation: Luka of incogblogo.net, blogging for Amnesty International.

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