Newman tells Amy Goodman that the only democratic candidate addressing poverty is Edwards:
~snip~
AMY GOODMAN I recently just heard John Edwards saying if he were not in the race, he doubts the word “poverty” would be raised again. Do you share that assessment Katherine Newman?
KATHERINE NEWMAN I absolutely share that assessment. As far as I’m concerned he’s the only candidate who has made the issue of poverty central. And this is why I am a supporter of his from the very beginning. he understands theses structural inequalities are not going to go away unless we attack the problem of poverty. Which is something we did whole heartedly during the Johnson years and we came back to it in many ways in the years that followed, but it is almost as though the poor do not exist. If we put together the poor, the 37 million poor people in the US with the over 50 million who are near poor, we’re talking about almost one-third of the American population. What are the democrats going to do for them? I think the meltdown in the economy has frightened everyone to the point where we are thinking only about the middle class. While the middle class is important, this huge population, 90 million people, over 30% of the nation’s children, deserve some attention. John Edwards was attempting to give it to them and still is.
~snip~
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/29/kathleen_newman_barbara_ehrenreich_president_bush