I guess black people should vote republican http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4766686/Struggling-survive-Mississippi-Delta.html Struggling to survive on the Mississippi Delta: Inside the lives of some of America's poorest people Persistent poverty has plagued the Mississippi Delta for decades In most Delta counties the poverty rate is 40 per cent, while nationally it's 15 Most residents, like Otibehia Allen, barely make ends meet even with two jobs Mississippi is also one of 19 states that rejected Medicare expansion Medicare is government health insurance given to the poorest Americans Republican governor Phil Bryant says he doesn't want people taking government handouts By Ap Reporter Published: 21:54 EDT, 6 August 2017 Otibehia Allen is a single mother who lives in a rented mobile home in the same isolated, poor community where she grew up among the cotton and soybean fields of the Mississippi Delta. During a summer that feels like a sauna, the trailer's air conditioner has conked out. Some nights, Allen and her five children find cooler accommodations with friends and relatives. +14 Otibehia Allen (Pictured) struggles to raise her five children as a single mother in one of the poorest communities in the nation +14 Allen works 30 hours a week to make ends meet as a data entry clerk and transportation dispatcher for a medical clinic +14 Barely making over minimum wage, Allen, 32 doesn't own a car, and public transportation is not widely available in the Delta Other nights, they sleep in the trailer with box fans circulating the stuffy air. Allen works 30 hours a week as a data entry clerk and transportation dispatcher for a medical clinic, pulling in barely over minimum wage. She doesn't own a car, and public transportation is not widely available. To get from home in Jonestown to work or even to go grocery shopping about 13 miles (21 kilometers) away in Clarksdale, Allen often pays people for a ride — sometimes $20 a pop. 'It's not easy raising five children alone,' Allen said, fighting back tears. 'No, you didn't ask me to have them, true. So, I chose to. So that means I'm responsible for these people.' Persistent poverty shapes daily existence in this expanse of agricultural flatland that gave birth to the blues. Jobs are scarce. Schools struggle for funding. Tens of thousands of families receive government food aid and health insurance. Fifty years ago, Democratic Sens. Robert F. Kennedy of New York and Joe Clark of Pennsylvania toured the Delta and saw ramshackle houses and starving children. Curtis Wilkie was a young reporter covering the senators' tour for a Delta newspaper, the Clarksdale Press Register. At one stop, Wilkie recalled, 'There was a little infant in a dirty diaper crawling around on the floor and eating rice — grains of rice that were on the floor that were dirty. Kennedy knelt by the child and didn't say a word, was stroking the little child's cheeks and his forehead.' Mississippi's congressional delegation in 1967, led by Democratic Sens. James Eastland and John Stennis and Rep. Jamie Whitten, resisted federal funding for food programs and for Head Start, a preschool program that many conservatives saw as a threat to the state's white, segregationist power structure because it educated poor black children. +14 Persistent poverty has plagued the Mississippi Delta for decades, suffering from neglect partly because state leaders are not willing to invest money into the community +14 Under the Affordable Care Act passed by President Barack Obama, states were given the option to expand Medicare, government health insurance given to the poorest Americans +14 But Mississippi was one of 19 states to reject program under second-term Republican governor Phil Bryant Wilkie said the trip had an enormous impact on Kennedy, whose eyes welled with tears at the sight of the child: 'No question that once he got back to Washington, he became a more passionate advocate for rural people.' Kennedy ran for president in 1968. Moments after winning the California primary, he was assassinated. Mississippi's second-term Republican governor, Phil Bryant, was born to a blue-collar family in the Delta in 1954. He frequently says he doesn't want people to be dependent on government. Under his tenure, Mississippi's been one of 19 states rejecting expansion of Medicaid, the federal and state health insurance program for the poor, under the health care law signed by former President Barack Obama. +14 Bryant frequently says he doesn't want people to be dependent on government handouts +14 Although opportunities have improved in the past 50 years, the Delta remains one of the most deprived regions in the US Bryant, who supports President Donald Trump, says job creation is the best way to combat poverty. Since he became governor, Mississippi has offered incentives to attract two tire manufacturing plants — one is open, the other being built. Neither is in the Delta. Although opportunities have improved in the past 50 years, the Delta remains one of the most deprived regions in the U.S. The national poverty rate is about 15 percent; it's 22 percent for Mississippi. In most Delta counties, it's 30 to 40 percent. +14 While the national poverty rate is 15 per cent, in most Delta counties it's 30 to 40 per cent Kennedy and Clark were accompanied to the Delta in 1967 by Marian Wright, a young civil rights lawyer working in Mississippi. In 1973, after she married and added to her name, Marian Wright Edelman founded Children's Defense Fund, a national group that advocates for social services for the poor. Edelman recently returned to Mississippi to examine how poverty continues shaping lives of people like Allen, the 32-year-old single mother. Both Edelman and Allen said they worry the Trump administration will cut social services that help the poor. +14 Marian Wright (Pictured), a young civil rights lawyer working in Mississippi, founded Children's Defense Fund in 1973 In Allen's two-bedroom trailer, her boys sleep in one room, her girls in another while she stays on the couch. She buys groceries in bulk because it's cheaper, and she knows how far she can stretch a family pack of chicken from the Piggly Wiggly. Allen's children, 9 to 14, are covered by Medicaid. She got a raise a few months ago — 40 cents an hour, just enough to make her lose her own Medicaid coverage. Her back and arms are in constant pain, but she won't see a doctor. 'I don't want to make a bill that I can't pay,' Allen said. +14 The Children's Defense Fund is a national group that advocates for social services for the poor +14 Otibehia Allen, cries as she recalls the lack of opportunity, limited health care and child poverty, her five children face daily while addressing a forum on food and health insecurity in Jonestown Dr. Barbara Ricks, a 49-year-old pediatrician, grew up poor in the Delta. Her family received food stamps; she attended Head Start and paid for college with scholarships and jobs. She has practiced medicine since 1999 in Greenville, one of the larger Delta cities — population 31,500. Ricks said about 95 percent of her patients are on Medicaid, some from small, rural communities 40 or 50 miles away because there are few clinics closer to home. She said patients from financially stable households generally are in better health than those living in poverty, who often deal with stress, obesity and diabetes. +14 Dr. Barbara Ricks (Pictured), a 49-year-old pediatrician, grew up poor in the Delta and paid for college with scholarships and jobs. +14 She has practiced medicine since 1999 in Greenville, one of the larger Delta cities population, providing healthcare to needy children in the area Concealing names to protect privacy, she said one of her patients is an 11-year-old boy with asthma who lives with his grandmother because his mom, single and unemployed, is overwhelmed raising his five younger siblings. He's been hospitalized because his grandmother, who also cares for an adult relative, leaves him 'minimally supervised' and misses regular asthma treatments, the doctor said. Ricks said another patient is an infant whose mother is a 15-year-old student. Though the mother intends to go to college, she sometimes misses days or weeks of class to care for her baby. 'Poverty is a social problem, but it's also a medical problem,' Ricks said. 'These kids have so many things working against them. And, although poor outcomes are expected, we should not accept it.' SHOCKING STATISTICS OF DELTA LIFE -The Mississippi Delta sits in Sunflower County, ranked 34th poorest county in America -Sunflower county has a population of 26,407 -Mississippi state has a population of nearly three million people, 35 per cent of which are black -Of the state's black population, 34 per cent reside in the Delta -The Mississippi Delta has 30 to 40 per cent unemployment -Years of discriminatory policies enacted before and during the Jim Crow era decimated black social mobility in the Delta -The majority of Mississippi Delta residents make slightly above minimum wage
wildchild,why don't you and your party support them outside of the womb? You pro life hypocrites fight for them to be born but than don't give a shit about them after they are born and try to take away every dollar that feeds them,houses them,provides healthcare to them,educates them etc.
Tony Stark, why don't you look at the state of blacks in any inner city run by democrats. Why not look at Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit, Oakland, etc, etc. These are total democrat run cities and they are disasters. After 50 years and trillions of dollars, why have the democrats failed so miserably? Either the democrats are grossly incompetent, or they dont really give a shit about blacks and are only using blacks as political pawns. What is it? When you have a black democrat President, a democrat governor, a black democrat mayor, a black democrat chief of police, a black democrat DA, why do say the death of Freddie Gray was racism. The democrats got their asses handed to them in the 2010 election, they got their asses handed to them in the 2012 election, they got their asses handed to them in 2014, then once again they got their asses handed to them in 2016. As it turns out the republicans aren't worth a fuck and are completely useless, but at least we dont have Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton in charge.
In the biggest highest turn out election in the country more people have voted for the democrat than the republican in 6 of the last 7 elections.Republicans have gerrymandering,the electoral college and democrats bunched together in big states and cities invalidating their votes in The EC and House races but the majority of the country support democrats over republicans.
Good to see that things are so much better for blacks after eight years of a semi-black President. Or not. Better for Michelle maybe. When she learned that he might be living in the White House some day she said it was the first time she was proud to be an American. Nice. A princeton and harvard law graduate.
Millions of them got health care,millions more would have if republican governors and republican state legislators didn't block medicaid expansion.