Tom Wakely for Congress / P.O. Box 1501, Columbus, NM 88029
Paid For By The Tom Wakely for Congress Campaign
Why am I running for Congress? It’s a good question, and one I wrestle with every day. The answer is simple: I want to do something about what’s wrong in our country, just as Lucy Coffey, a World War II veteran and one of the hospice patients my wife and I cared for, taught me. Let me tell you about Lucy and why her story inspires my congressional run.
Lucy enlisted in the newly formed WAAC, which later became the Women's Army Corps (WAC) in 1943 at the age of 37. She served in the Pacific Theatre, rising to the rank of sergeant before being discharged in 1945. For her service, she earned the Philippine Liberation Ribbon with a bronze star, an Asiatic Pacific Theatre Ribbon with one bronze star, a World War II Victory Medal, the WAC Service Medal, and a Good Conduct Medal. After her military discharge, she continued to work as a civilian for the U.S. Army in Okinawa, Japan, for 13 years, and then at Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, until her retirement in 1971. In July 2014, at the age of 108, my wife took Lucy to the White House at the invitation of Vice President Biden to meet him and President Obama. At their White House meeting, the President praised her for her "patriotic love of country.”
After Lucy returned home, she and I spent hours a day talking about her life, her military service and my life and my military service. One day, I asked her how she came to enlist, and this is what she told me. She said she was appalled by the horrors of the war, the rise of fascism in Europe, and Japan’s militaristic government’s bombing of Pearl Harbor. She said she wanted to do something more than just support the men who were fighting and dying; she wanted to be a part of the fight. And she was presented with that opportunity when the Women's Army Corps (WAC) was created.
She said as soon as she heard the news, she quit her job at an A&P grocery store in Dallas and rushed down to one of the dozens of recruitment offices in the city to enlist. But she was told she was too short and underweight to enlist. Not to be deterred, she went back the next day to another recruitment office, this time with a pair of lifts in her shoes. Though she passed the height requirement, she was once again denied the opportunity to enlist as she was underweight. Again, not to be deterred, she went back the next day to another recruitment office, this time with lifts in her shoes and rocks in her pockets. The next week, she reported for duty.
The moral of this story, Lucy told me, is this: If you see something that isn’t right, do something about it, no matter how many times it takes or how many obstacles you have to overcome. That is why I am running for Congress. I believe both parties, including pro-business, centrist Democrats like Rep. Gabe Vasquez, share responsibility for our current problems.