Some thoughts from the New York Times on poverty and the New Orleans disaster:

• "If Sept. 11 showed the power of a nation united in response to a devastating attack, Hurricane Katrina reveals the fault lines of a region and a nation, rent by profound social divisions."
  Mark Naison, Fordham University
  
  
• "It's dangerous to be poor. It's dangerous to be black. It's dangerous to be Latino."
  Martín Espada, the University of Massachusetts
  
  
• "Most cities have a hidden or not always talked about poor population, black and white, and most of the time we look past them. This is a moment in time when we can't look past them. Their plight is coming to the forefront now. They were the ones less able to hop in a car and less able to drive off."
  Spencer R. Crew, president and chief executive officer of the national Underground Railroad Freedom Center