NYTimes hates white people

I know it's the New York Times, but...

The story of Sam Ross has the makings of a ballad, with its heart-rending arc from hardscrabble childhood to decorated war hero to hardscrabble adulthood.

hardscrabble? Here's how the American Heritage dictionary defines it:

Earning a bare subsistence, as on the land; marginal: the sharecropper's hardscrabble life.

Does this really make sense? I think we should introduce a feature called "ask a sharecropper."

Also, I think the article is bordering on exploitive. Take a look at this:

When he was just shy of 12, Mr. Ross moved in with his father’s father, who for a time was married to his mother’s mother.

and

His grandfather, 72, a former coal miner who sells used cars, said, “I’m not an alcoholic. I can quit. I just love the taste of it.”

It's a feature on the front page, so I think it's safe to say that the New York Times hates white people.

-j