WP
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/18/AR2006021801295.htmlAfter War Injury, an Iraq Vet Takes on Politics
By Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 19, 2006
CHICAGO, Feb. 18 The smiling candidate in rimless eyeglasses and a long woolen skirt maneuvers carefully among tables and chairs as she works a crowded Starbucks. She is taking small steps, and the reason for the slight awkwardness in her gait is not instantly clear.
Reaching to shake hands with a voter, she says: "You may have heard of me. I'm the Iraq war vet who's running. I was injured over there." Talking with another, she says: "I actually lost both my legs. I can walk because I got really good health care."
Tammy Duckworth, Democratic candidate for Congress, cannot escape the catastrophic wounds she suffered as an Army helicopter pilot in Iraq. And, for the purposes of her candidacy, she does not want to. For better or worse, her injuries are her signature, her motivator and, she hopes, her ticket into the consciousness of voters in the Illinois 6th District.
"I can't avoid the interest in the fact that I'm an injured female soldier," Duckworth, 37, says in an interview at her campaign headquarters in Lombard, west of Chicago. "Understand that I'm going to use this as a platform."
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Duckworth, who considers the Iraq war a mistake, is among about a dozen veterans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan running for federal office this year, at last count all but one of them Democrats. The party leadership is calculating that candidates who wore the uniform can offer a credible counterpoint on national security to Republicans who have dominated the debate from the campaign trail to Capitol Hill.