The American Spectator

Are you like me? If you are, you’re constantly amazed by and grateful for the bountiful opportunities this country affords to anyone willing to work for them. Living as I do in the New York metropolitan area, I’ve seen places that were formerly considered the ”wrong side of the tracks” transformed into beautiful apartment complexes. And in my own previously all-white neighborhood, we have a great assortment of families of all colors and creeds living in houses that only a generation ago would have been impossible for them to afford.

Go into almost any store or shop and you’re likely to see all types of folks walking around on their expensively clad feet, swiping their credit and ATM cards with their carefully manicured hands. Drive through any neighborhood in any town — even in run-down areas — and check out the crowded restaurants while perusing the satellite dishes adorning the homes; homes filled with purchases that were once considered luxury items that now grace even the most humble of abodes.

p>So maybe you, like me, experience confusion when politicos like John Edwards incessantly trumpet two Americas; one of which apparently contains those living in dire poverty and despair. Take his comments on the newly released data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Housing and Household Economic Statistics Division on poverty: br> /p>

The reality that we have two Americas was confirmed again today by new data from the Census Bureau. These statistics show what most Americans know: tens of millions of our fellow citizens are completely left out of the economic progress enjoyed by the individuals and corporations on the very top.

br> Can this be true? Are there that many people in this country who live without the most basic of comforts and have no access to the American Dream? The Heritage Foundation’s Robert E. Rector has written a fine piece cataloging the Census Bureau’s statistics and linked to all the pertinent data. If you’re anything like me, some of the highlights might not surprise you: br> ul>