Buried in the Paper

From Michael Powell's "Reporter's Notebook" deep within today's New York Times:

Policy, Up Close

Early Tuesday, in Powder Springs, Ga., policy takes flesh before the candidate’s eyes.

Jeana Brown raises her arm in a forest of outstretched hands in the bleachers at the high school and Mr. Obama points to her — “Me?!” “Yes, you” — and voice quaking, Ms. Brown says:

“I am one of your small contributors — $5 actually,” she says.

She wants to tell Mr. Obama, who is talking about the 30 percent increase in the number of Americans who have filed for bankruptcy, about her trailer.

She is 50 and her husband, James, is 48, and they worked and snipped coupons and saved for five years to afford their double-wide trailer. Their credit report had the usual nicks and dents, and so they took a 9.25 percent interest rate on their loan. They relied on their broker’s promise “that if we were good and made our payments, we could refinance at a better rate after a year.”

A year later, Ms. Brown walked back in. The broker told her that because their trailer did not have a concrete foundation — which costs thousands more dollars than they had — she and her husband could not refinance.

A job disappeared and they faced foreclosure. The couple doubled up on interest payments, from $670 to $1,378 per month. They cut off Internet and cable service and held three yard sales — everything must go!

They saved their home.

Now her husband drives a truck six weeks at a stretch and she works two jobs. Ms. Brown’s chest heaves, her voice a quivering reed.

“I tell you, I’m not sure how we keep doing this,” she says.

Obama shakes his head. The gymnasium had gone silent.

“Look,” he says, “Jeana is an example of America. Someone who is working hard, who saved, doing all the right things and then gets put into a financial bind primarily because people took advantage of her situation.”

Afterward, Ms. Brown watches him work the rope line. She has brown hair and piercing eyes and hails from coal country; she is proud to describe herself as a white “redneck.”

Her husband, James, is black. When she heard Mr. Obama’s speech on race in Philadelphia, she wrote her check. “I researched him; he’s real,” she says. “I haven’t voted in 32 years but he’s got mine.”

She touches a reporter’s arm; she’s got a question.

“Do you think we’ll be able to save our trailer?”