The knee-deep potholes on Cotton Street were filled just hours before Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards arrived this week. Residents had waited years for them to be fixed in a city so overwhelmed by poverty it once moved the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to tears.<\/p>\n
At a smoked-ribs barbecue, Edwards invoked the legacy of King, calling it an honor to walk in the same places the civil rights leader did and to bring fresh attention to the poor and disenfranchised.<\/p>\n
“But we still have work to do,” Edwards said Monday to the dozens gathered on the first day of his three-day tour through poor communities in the United States.<\/p>\n
From the underpaid poultry workers in the Mississippi Delta to the uninsured coal miners in Appalachia, Edwards’s “Road to One America” tour was designed to showcase what he calls the “other America” of boarded-up factories and foreclosed homes. It was also part of an effort to develop a defining theme for his campaign. But he is not the only Democrat to highlight the 37 million Americans living in poverty as a focal point of the 2008 presidential election.<\/p>\n
After decades of promoting economic growth as the best cure for poverty, Democrats are trying to woo voters with promises of direct financial aid and to reach out to people who have seen their lives worsen over the last eight years. Democrats are now embracing such solutions to combat entrenched poverty, and in the process taking on Republicans on issues beyond the war in Iraq.<\/p>\n