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While millions of American families struggle with falling house prices, soaring gasoline costs and tightening credit, some environmentalists, urban planners and urban real estate speculators are welcoming the bad news as signaling what they have long dreamed of -- the demise of suburbia. In a March Atlantic article, Christopher B. Leinberger, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution and a professor of urban planning, contended that yesterday's new suburbs will become "the slums" of tomorrow because high gas prices and the housing meltdown will force Americans back to the urban core. Leinberger is not alone. Other pundits, among them author...

CHESTER, Ill. -- The rookie state senator from Chicago had driven 340 miles to explore southern Illinois, but Barb Brown could muster only 20 Democrats in this small town on the Mississippi River to have breakfast with him. She asked her niece and sister-in-law, who were helping in the kitchen, to come out to pad the audience. "We tried to convince people that they needed to come out and meet with this senator from Chicago, who on top of everything else was African American," Brown, a circuit court clerk, said of the 1997 gathering. "We had people looking at us...

TCHULA, Miss. — Gasoline prices reached a national average of $4 a gallon for the first time over the weekend, adding more strain to motorists across the country. But the pain is not being felt uniformly. Across broad swaths of the South, Southwest and the upper Great Plains, the combination of low incomes, high gas prices and heavy dependence on pickup trucks and vans is putting an even tighter squeeze on family budgets. Here in the Mississippi Delta, some farm workers are borrowing money from their bosses so they can fill their tanks and get to work. Some are switching...

Driver's would love these pumps if gas goes through the roof, except human ingenuity has trumped technology. Junek's has the pumps set for half the price you'll actually pay, so if the meter reads you've filled up $20-worth, you'll still have to pay $40. duh

Texas Gov. Rick Perry wants to build a big highway through the Lone Star State. No, make that a really big highway, as in a monstrously big highway. The exact route hasn't been determined. The mega-highway would run roughly from Laredo on the Rio Grande River through the Hill Country and the Piney Woods and then through Texarkana in that tiny portion of the state that borders Arkansas. Imagine for a moment if that thoroughfare would be pointed in the other direction - from the Valley, through the South Plains and then through the heart of the Panhandle, right past...

As Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., avoids any real campaigning in West Virginia, the former president of the United States is out there ginning up resentments. Bill Clinton has the right to say whatever he wants, of course. But he's a smart man. Brilliant, even. He can do the math. He must know that it's quite improbable that his wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., will be the Democratic presidential nominee. So what purpose does it serve for him to barnstorm a state like West Virginia and tell rural voters that Obama and his elitist political/media cabal allies are mocking Appalachia? He's...

Killing Local America by Donald Devine Issue 106 - April 23, 2008 So it is a conservative canard that government aid means government control? Liberal New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine is out to prove the conservatives right. He recently announced in his state budget message that he would drastically cut or eliminate state aid to its 323 towns with populations of fewer than 10,000 if they did not consolidate themselves into larger, more “efficient” units. There is not much greater control than elimination. Gov. Corzine won his reputation as a mergers and acquisitions chairman of the investment banking firm Goldman...

Before the Second World War, American Westerns presented what later came to be seen as a "naive" view of what might be called white borderer culture and conflicts. The "good" of the Scots-Irish based and European immigrant and settler population was not just an underlying assumption but a central and explicit thesis in the Westerns, most of which were made by “poverty row” studios and distributed to rural and small-town theaters—and seen by the grandchildren of the very people portrayed. By the 1950s, this was no longer the case. The movie Western had moved from “poverty row” (abetting the demise...

NARROWS, Va. (AP) -- Allen Neely eases his Chrysler Pacifica onto the bridge named in honor of Jarrett Lane, who grew up in this tiny town near the West Virginia state line. Mr. Lane, Mr. Neely says quietly, always wanted to build a bridge. Under the back seat are two pistols. Mr. Neely keeps them close these days. He and his construction crew were in Virginia Tech's Norris Hall a year ago this week when a mentally ill student went on a rampage, killing Jarrett Lane and 31 others. Since then, Mr. Neely feels safer if his guns are within...

The dirty little secret about Barack Obama's indictment of flyover country is that he said what liberals, including Hillary Clinton, believe. Sufficient proof of this can be found in the liberal outrage at Wednesday night's Democratic presidential debate, where Obama was pressed both by the moderators and Clinton to explain Bitter-gate, Wright-gate, Ayers-gate and Flag pin-gate. Consider the uncannily similar reactions of columnists Tom Shales and Stephen Silver. Shales expressed indignation that ABC News moderators Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos would dare ask Obama to justify his insulting remarks about small-town Americans and his relationships with certain anti-American people. Shale's...

Last week in Terre Haute, Ind., Mr. Obama explained that the people he had in mind “don’t vote on economic issues, because they don’t expect anybody’s going to help them.” He added: “So people end up, you know, voting on issues like guns, and are they going to have the right to bear arms. They vote on issues like gay marriage. And they take refuge in their faith and their community and their families and things they can count on. But they don’t believe they can count on Washington.” This is a remarkably detailed and vivid account of the political...

Presidential hopeful Barack Obama, accused of being elitist for remarks he made about small-town American voters, said on Tuesday the slap at his background is amusing and signals a nation in the midst of "political silly season." The Democratic senator, campaigning in Pennsylvania, dismissed the charges of being elitist and out of touch by fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton and by Republican John McCain as unfounded, given his background. "I am amused about this notion of elitist, given that when you're raised by a single mom, when you were on food stamps for a while when you were growing up, you...

The furor surrounding Barack Obama’s comments about “bitter” small-town voters and their faith clouds an emerging story line that stood to benefit the eventual Democratic nominee at Republican John McCain’s expense. That narrative was an ironic twist on longstanding partisan stereotypes: a November election that figured to be between a Democrat who is comfortable talking about faith and a Republican who is not. But the Illinois senator’s controversial remarks about “bitter” small-town Pennsylvanians who “cling” to religion and other cultural stances out of economic despair — comments immediately characterized by New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and McCain as condescending...

Typically when politicians want to bury bad news, they put it out late on a Friday -- which is precisely when this story broke. But for at least five reasons, this story may only gain steam in the days ahead. First, Obama and his campaign are attacking the problem head-on, seeking to "hang a lantern on their problem." The candidate sought to clarify his comments last night in Terre Haute, Indiana, and did more of the same today. But this morning in Muncie he also offered something approaching a mea culpa, which he pointedly did not last night. "I didn’t...

In their attempts to spin away from Barack Obama’s stunningly stupid remarks at a San Francisco fundraiser last weekend, Democrats and the Obama campaign have focused on only the least objectionable portion of the comment as a means to frame the national discussion. In a single sentence where Obama called small-town Midwestern voters overly religious bigots who cling to their guns out of frustration with George Bush, the Democrats have decided to build their defense on “bitter”. Here’s the original remark: And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who...

Barack Obama showed his deft political touch today, and demonstrated his keen insight into the lives of the little people in this country, with a speech that is sure to be worth at least thirty points in Pennsylvania in the upcoming primary: You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them... And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade...

INDIANAPOLIS -- Hillary Clinton slammed Barack Obama for comments he made at fundraiser last Sunday where he said middle class Americans are “bitter” about the state of the economy. “I was taken aback by the demeaning remarks Senator Obama made about people in small town America,” Clinton said. “Senator Obama’s remarks are elitist and out of touch. They are not reflective of the values and beliefs of Americans, certainly not the Americans I know, not the Americans I grew up with, not the Americans I grew up with in Arkansas or the Americans I represent in New York.” Referring to...

INDIANAPOLIS - (WANE) - The Indiana Republican Party is calling on Indiana Democrats in Congress to denounce Barack Obama's criticism of Midwestern values at a San Francisco fundraiser last Sunday. Indiana Republican Party spokesman Jay Kenworthy issued the following statement on Barack Obama's comments posted below. "Indiana is full of decent people who support gun rights because they believe in the Constitution and place a premium on religion because they are people of faith -- not because we are bitter as Obama stated. Perhaps this is something Barack Obama doesn't understand, but surely our Congressional delegation does. "I can't imagine...

I'm about done with Obama over this mill-closures-drive-small-town-losers-to-guns-and-God business. If you're running as a glamorous blank slate on which people project their own utopian fantasies, you've got to be very careful not to give the game away - especially when the game turns out to be the usual cliched elite disdain for the great unwashed. I mention in the current issue of NR how odd it is that Michelle Obama is in many ways more condescending on the stump than Teresa Heinz Kerry. Now her husband's at it, too. As Ed Driscoll says: Leave it to Obama to make John...

MUNCIE, Ind - After a full throated response to criticism that he is condescending, Democrat Barack Obama on Saturday conceded that that comments he made about bitter working class voters who "cling to guns or religion" were ill chosen. "I didn't say it as well as I should have," he said. As Obama tried to quell the furor, presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton hit him with one of her lengthiest and most pointed criticisms to date. "Senator Obama's remarks were elitist and out of touch," she said, campaigning about an hour away in Indianapolis. "They are not reflective of the...

PHILADELPHIA, April 11 -- Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and John McCain sharply criticized Sen. Barack Obama on Friday for saying at a private April 6 fundraiser in San Francisco that small-town voters in economically distressed areas of Pennsylvania are "bitter." "Well, that's not my experience," Clinton told a crowd of several hundred at Drexel University. "As I travel around Pennsylvania, I meet people who are resilient, who are optimistic, who are positive. . . . They're working hard every day for a better future for themselves and their children. Pennsylvanians don't need a president who looks down on them. They...

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. - Sen. Barack Obama was criticized Friday by his two fellow presidential candidates for statements he made recently at a San Francisco fundraiser that could be viewed as derogatory toward rural America. "You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them," Obama said Sunday, according to the Huffington Post web site. "And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate...

Democrat Hillary Clinton criticized presidential rival Barack Obama on Friday for describing small-town Pennsylvania residents as bitter and said she would help economically struggling communities, not look down on them. Clinton, whose once big Pennsylvania lead over Obama in opinion polls has been shrinking ahead of their April 22 primary election showdown, said residents in small towns suffering from job losses across the state were resilient and optimistic. "Pennsylvania doesn't need a president who looks down on them," she said at a rally in Philadelphia. "They need a president who stands up for them, who fights for them, who works...

McCain camp hammers Obama on small town comments The McCain campaign, finding a gift in its lap, tees off on the eye-opening comments by Barack Obama from a fundraiser last week in San Francisco (of all places). Asked to respond, McCain adviser Steve Schmidt called it a "remarkable statement and extremely revealing." "It shows an elitism and condescension towards hardworking Americans that is nothing short of breathtaking," Schmidt said. "It is hard to imagine someone running for president who is more out of touch with average Americans." Said Obama, as recorded by a HuffPost writer in attendance: "You go into...

Hillary Clinton and John McCain both ripped into Barack Obama Friday for reportedly saying residents of small-town America “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them” out of bitterness over lost jobs, a remark his opponents interpreted as arrogant...

The Huffington Post's Mayhill Fowler reports that, at that same San Francisco fundraiser where Obama revealed his previously unknown college sojourn to Pakistan, the junior senator from Illinois seemed to try to get inside the mind of small towners in Pennsylvania, with a dose of sociology and a dollop of dime-store psychology. "You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them," Obama said. "And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration...

Mayhill Fowler has more from Obama's remarks at a San Francisco fundraiser Sunday, and they include an attempt to explain the resentment in small-town Pennsylvania that won't be appreciated by some of the people whose votes Obama's seeking: You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them...And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising...

<p>You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them...And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.</p>

MERCED, Calif. (AP) - The end came in a blink outside the Merced County courthouse. Only six people showed up for the foreclosure auction, Janice Pimentel and her son Nick included. By chance, the Pimentels' dairy farm was the first property offered. The auctioneer, a young man in aviator sunglasses and blue jeans, read their address and paused for bids. When none came, the Joe T and Janice R Pimentel Dairy Farm, 21 years in the life of the family, officially became the property of its main creditor, a local lender. "Well," Janice Pimentel said, "that's that." The Pimentels' farm...

Corzine, who presided over mergers and acquisitions as chairman of Goldman Sachs, is telling hundreds of New Jersey's smallest towns and boroughs that they are too small to exist. Multiple layers of government are financially wasteful, he says, and the littlest towns and boroughs need to merge with their bigger neighbors to achieve economies of scale. Corzine's incentive -- more like a hammer -- is a threatened cutoff of state aid. Under the governor's proposed budget, the state's 323 towns with populations of fewer than 10,000 people would face drastic cuts if they do not consolidate. Towns with populations between...

CONNELL, Wash. (AP) - Bill Bennett has spent 45 years feeding and herding 2,500 cattle on his rolling eastern Washington ranch. He's also had to act as a doctor because he's unable to find a veterinarian who will come to his rural spread. He's not alone, as farmers and ranchers across the country complain of a shortage of large-animal veterinarians. A federal program created in 2003 to help the situation sits dormant while the U.S. Department of Agriculture writes rules. In addition to caring for livestock and pets, veterinarians monitor and inspect a large portion of the food supply and...

Record grain prices boost rural economy By ROXANA HEGEMAN, Associated Press Writer Fri Mar 7, 6:31 AM ET Record-high grain prices are fueling a rural economic boom in farm states such as Kansas. Farm equipment dealers have a backlog of several months in orders for new machinery. Cropland rents are rising, along with agricultural land prices. And with spring planting just weeks away, farmers are watching the volatile commodities markets as they decide which crops to grow in the coming season. While their city neighbors are struggling with foreclosures and fears of a recession, a lot more money is circulating...

URRY, Va. (AP) -- A husband went to the hospital. A wife passed away. Cancer struck. Grandchildren were born. The full-time job and the two young kids just got too overwhelming. And so it came to be that in Dendron, no one remembered to run for Town Council or mayor this year. "We forgot," said Ruth Sheffield, a current councilwoman in the tiny Surry County town of just under 300 souls. "We usually have a reminder and we didn't get that reminder. We should have known. It's our fault." There was a time when this wouldn't have happened in Dendron....

West Virginia boils at 'inbred' epithet; movie casting director fired By David M. Brown and Mike Wereschagin TRIBUNE-REVIEW Wednesday, February 27, 2008 The producers of the horror thriller "Shelter" have fired the Pittsburgh casting director who outraged West Virginians by publically seeking odd-looking -- even physically deformed -- people to portray residents of a West Virginia "holler." The reaction from West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin and others was swift after a story appeared in the Tribune-Review with a comment from Donna Belajac Casting of Pittsburgh indicating the script for a movie being shot here needs actors with an inbred look...

According to Franklin County Sheriff Ewell Hunt, this morning's lockdown at Ferrum College began with an incident around 7:30 a.m. Hunt said a white male carrying a handgun was seen by a housekeeper walking into Bassett Hall. The man told the housekeeper not to say anything. There was no shooting incident, Hunt said, but two people were detained and questioned as persons of interest. Officials are still looking for the suspect now, Hunt said, and they are searching dorms and buildings on campus.

Film's casting call wants that 'inbred' look By David M. Brown TRIBUNE-REVIEW Tuesday, February 26, 2008 A movie about to be filmed in Pittsburgh is casting Gothic characters -- including an albino-like girl and deformed people -- to depict West Virginia mountain people. "'Regular-looking" children need not apply.

ALBION, Neb. -- The U.S. economy may be teetering on the brink of recession. But there's a bountiful harvest down on the farm. Grain prices are surging to historic levels. Spring wheat, a variety often used in bread, hit a record $18.53 per bushel yesterday. Corn is trading above $5 and soybeans are bringing in more than $13, all 25% or more above their year-ago prices. Net farm income is expected to hit $92.3 billion in 2008 -- a 51% increase over the 10-year average of $61.1 billion. Across much of the Great Plains, unemployment rates are well below national...

The Baby Boomers’ retirement will change the texture of society in ways we’ve scarcely begun to contemplate. A dispatch from America’s coming silver age It is cliché to speak of sleepy little country towns, but my mother’s hometown goes beyond sleepy into Rip van Winkle territory. Newark, New York, has more churches than bars. Neat clapboards and stately Victorians line quiet streets wrapped tight around the Erie Canal. Drive through Newark quickly, and it looks like America’s past. Stay a little longer, and you begin to recognize it as our future. Walk into one of those churches on a typical...

PATROL BASE CORREGIDOR, Iraq — Thinking medical care, schools and water would be the main concerns of a farming area in Iraq, an Army officer was surprised to find out roads, canals and drinking water were the three top priorities. It should have occurred to Capt. Brandon Cave that the small rural area in his area of operation would be connected to agricultural needs. He was born and raised in a rural area of the United States. Roads to get products to market. Canals to bring water from the Euphrates River to irrigate the land. Drinking water to create a...

The Senate removed a provision from the energy bill that would have extended for four years payments to rural counties that once depended on federal timber money to pay for schools and libraries. A House bill approved last week would set aside more than $1.5 billion to compensate 700 rural counties in 39 states -- mostly in the South and West -- that were hurt by federal logging cutbacks in the 1990s. An additional $350 million would have gone to rural states through a program that reimburses state and local governments for federally owned property. The timber plan had support...

A vote on a controversial proposal by a Muslim group to build a large retreat and worship center on farmland in a rural Maryland town has been postponed. The Walkersville Board of Zoning Appeals was scheduled to hold a final public hearing and vote Thursday on a plan by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community to build a worship facility on a 224-acre farm in the town. But according to the Frederick News-Post, the Board voted this morning to postpone the hearing until January 8, with a continuation of January 15. An attorney for the Muslim group said he might not...

Maryland town wary of plans for mosque : Religion : Boulder Daily,p> ...Worries about everything from Islam to traffic divide town ... "Muslims are a whole different culture from us," said the mayor, Ralph Whitmore, ... www.dailycamera.com/news/2007/oct/19/maryland-town-wary-of-plans-for-mosque/

According to Otis, there are indications that homegrown gangs are forming here. But members of nationally known gangs, such as the notorious Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13, are here too, he said. Otis recalled one case he worked as a school resource officer at Fauquier High School in 2005. The case involved a teen who had lived in Warrenton for only a couple of weeks. Based on the way he dressed and other factors, Otis said he determined that the teen was affiliated with a gang. Further investigation determined that he was affiliated with MS-13 and was wanted by Fairfax County...

Changes in Meatpacking Industry Remake Rural U.S. Towns in New Immigration Frontier DODGE CITY, Kan. - This is the home of Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson, of Boot Hill and the Long Branch Saloon, of cattle drives, buffalo hunters and the romance of the American West. But that's the Dodge City of yesteryear. Today, downtown has Mexican restaurants and stores more reminiscent of shops south of the border than Main Street Kansas. The city of 25,176 even has a new nickname: "Little Mexico." Signs advertising "Envios a Mexico" -- retail outlets where workers send hard-earned wages back home to Mexico...

DODGE CITY, Kan. (AP) -- This is the home of Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson, of Boot Hill and the Long Branch Saloon, of cattle drives, buffalo hunters and the romance of the American West. But that's the Dodge City of yesteryear. ADVERTISEMENT Today, downtown has Mexican restaurants and stores more reminiscent of shops south of the border than Main Street Kansas. The city of 25,176 even has a new nickname: "Little Mexico." Signs advertising "Envios a Mexico" -- retail outlets where workers send hard-earned wages back home to Mexico and other countries -- hang outside many Dodge City stores....

FRONT ROYAL, Va. — This small Shenandoah Valley town must wait to become a battleground for the growing public debate about whether the General Assembly overreached in assessing high fees for Virginia drivers who break the law. The Town Council last night postponed a decision on whether to stop its 36-officer police force from enforcing most "abuser fees" laws for motorists. "It seems to me it may be appealing in a kind of small guy versus big guy way, but I'm not sure that is the answer here," said council member Stanley W. Brooks Jr., who proposed postponing the vote....

In a classic application of bottom-up management denizens of small towns let their elected representatives in Washington D.C. know exactly how they expected them to handle the compromised immigration compromise bill that neither secured our borders, nor was any more enforceable than previous legislation it was meant to "fix."Earlier waves of immigrants – legal and illegal – flocked to CA, , FL, IL, NJ, NY and TX ("gateway" states) but have been dispersing across a wider swath of the U.S. since 2000. The foreign-born, non-English speaking populations of DE, GA, IN, NE, NV and SC have exploded, say demographers, with...

(Farms sprout again, with demand for less-carcinogenic crop) When Rick Sime walks through a field of burley tobacco, he sees opportunities and a way to remain connected with his rural heritage. The Vernon County high school teacher, baseball coach and tobacco farmer grew up on a family farm that raised a few acres of tobacco every year, partly as a way to generate some extra cash. For decades, farm families such as Sime's in south-central and southwestern Wisconsin raised a few acres of tobacco to generate extra cash. The leaves grown here were used in chewing tobacco or to wrap...

Source: University of Minnesota Date: June 29, 2007 Where Is The Most Dangerous Place To Travel Over The Holiday? Science Daily — Just in time for the most dangerous days of the year to drive -- July 3 and 4 -- the national Center for Excellence in Rural Safety (CERS) at the University of Minnesota today released a list of the states where Americans are more likely to die in a traffic crash on a rural road; and Minnesota makes the top 15. According to the study, 72 percent of Minnesota's traffic fatalities happen on rural roads. While U.S. Census...

Deer Hunting with Jesus Things You May Not Know June 19, 2007 Long ago, having had to write more book reviews than I wanted, I decided that I would rather have pile surgery by an ocelot than write another. Then I got an advance copy of Deer Hunting with Jesus, by Joe Bageant, and realized that I had to come out of retirement. It’s, you know, like noblesse oblige. Here goes. Bageant is a redneck, and his book is about rednecks, who are a huge, sprawling class of people found everywhere but mostly invisible. They aren’t what people think they...