Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards wrapped up a three-day campaign swing through Iowa this weekend and in this coming week he’ll visit eight states that, unlike Iowa, do not host the first contests in the 2008 presidential campaign.
"The idea is beginning in New Orleans and then traveling through a whole series of states — both rural and urban areas — to shine a bright light on the poverty that exists in this country and secondly, to focus on potential solutions," Edwards said during a telephone interview with Radio Iowa.
In the summer of 2005, Edwards told the Iowa Coalition on Housing and the Homeless that poverty was a "moral issue" and he’s taking that message on this week’s 18-hundred mile tour.
"I believe Iowa Caucus-goers care about this issue," Edwards said. "I believe Americans care about this issue." Edwards plans to end his poverty tour in Prestonsburg, Kentucky. That’s where Robert F. Kennedy concluded his 1968 tour of the nation’s poverty-stricken south.