So how can disadvantaged Americans get the sustained attention of their legislators? How can poverty, segregation, and discrimination get the place on the public agenda they deserve to have? The classic answer offered by American politics is simple: mobilize, elect some legislators if your own, and find ways of challenging those legislators who continue to ignore your issues. There’s just one problem with this: there isn’t much history of success in the US for poor people’s movements. I suppose specialists could offer some reasons for why that would be true — poor people don’t vote, poor people are distributed in small numbers over numerous districts, poor people can be misled by political rhetoric too — but it’s hard too think of parties or majorities who have paid serious attention to poor people’s issues. (How much political influence does the homeless guy selling the homeless people’s newspaper on Main Street really have?)