Rural Poverty Commentaries
"And while all the Appalachians are geographically almost identical, the poor areas have one thing in common: 400 million years ago, they were endowed with coal"
"[A]bility to grow up in the mountains with better housing, health and education will be the transforming factors for Appalachia"
"The Herald-Leader dismisses the experiences of thousands of Eastern Kentuckians who have felt the stigma of poverty. It's sad that people who are better off are so repelled by the inevitable unattractiveness of poverty"
"It is easy to understand why people in Eastern Kentucky resent the impression given once again that extreme poverty defines the entire region"
"Yet, fewer than 400 dentists are significant providers of care for an estimated 300,000 poor Kentucky kids. No wonder chronically poor Eastern Kentucky has the nation's highest rate of tooth loss"
"Take a look at Mississippi, which has poverty worse than the Appalachians. Look at Alabama and Georgia, along with parts of Florida. Go to any big city and you will find it there as well"
"It was no celebrity puff piece, but a sharp critique of mountaintop-removal mining, the coal industry and the endless cycle of poverty she said coal has brought to Appalachia"
"He understood -- understands -- the gulf that exists in North Carolina between the urban enclaves of mansions and BMWs and boutiques and the soul-crushing poverty of so many rural communities and hard-luck city neighborhoods"
"It has resisted change and remains ridden with poverty and an image that defies change"