First off, degenerate matter can still have free electrons; in that state, it is essentially a squeezed metal. And that's what most of a white dwarf is.

Also, I have used a special definition of "cold" here -- temperature being low to contribute significant internal pressure. By that definition, a white dwarf is cold.

And as to good nontechnical references to how degenerate matter works, I don't know of any offhand.

Maybe we ought to have some sections on stellar structure, both nontechnical and with simple algebra.