<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"  The fourth in a daily series \u2014 Esquire&amp;#039;s historic collection of wisdom from the 111th Congress... When I was a girl, my dad was in the Air Force, stationed at Andrews Air Force base. On Sundays he would have to go to work, so he&amp;#039;d be in his uniform, but after church we&amp;#039;d picnic on the west side of the Capitol grounds. We&amp;#039;d roll down the hill in our Sunday dresses, my sister and I. And now that&amp;#039;s where I work. No day is alike, nor should it be. People who work hard and pay attention to substance get things done. I was eleventh-grade class president. That was the first elective office I held until I came into Congress. I challenged an eight-term incumbent, and beating an eight-term incumbent almost never happens. Most people asked, Why are you running? They took it as a joke. But I got up early every morning, went to every metro station, knocked on every single door, talked to people in the parking lot by every store. And I won. When you&amp;#039;re buying bread or eggs, nobody at the checkout counter asks if you&amp;#039;re a Democrat or Republican. They ask for your cash. I&amp;#039;ll tell you one thing: Whether you do it in eleventh grade or in a Congressional election, winning is good. I&amp;#039;m headed down to the Johnson Space Center because I sit on the Science and Technology Committee. My first call was to a Republican who also sits on the committee, to see if we could meet. It felt like the natural thing to do. There are differences in our approach to politics. That doesn&amp;#039;t mean it has to be poison. Power is getting things done without having to demonstrate that you can bulldoze it through. I&amp;#039;m most effective when I&amp;#039;ve studied an issue, when I can make a credible argument, and then bring people along. There are some people who exercise power by saying, &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s my way or the highway.&amp;quot; That&amp;#039;s less effective in the long run. My arrest for protesting the events of Darfur outside the Sudanese embassy was the first time I&amp;#039;ve ever been arrested for anything. I had to explain to my mother why. She was cool with it. I also had to explain to my son. What I told them was that it was one of those moments where you could call attention to our failed policy with respect to the horror of what was happening in Darfur. It was to say that we stand in alliance with people who suffer. It was worth doing. But going to jail is not something I necessarily want to repeat. The door clicks,  you can&amp;#039;t really see out and you&amp;#039;re unable to get out. You can hear voices, but not completely, you just know that something&amp;#039;s going on. You&amp;#039;re left to reading all the messages that have been scratched on the walls. For me, it was temporary. I knew that I&amp;#039;d be released. But it did make me think about so many young men and women who are incarcerated and don&amp;#039;t know what tomorrow&amp;#039;s going to look like. Often I feel there are some things that I bring to the table as a woman, a mother and a lawyer that add value to the conversation. When you compare the percentage to the general population, there are not enough women in Congress. Sometimes I hear reported on the news that folks are apathetic. I don&amp;#039;t think that&amp;#039;s true at all. I think people are incredibly busy. I think they&amp;#039;re like I was when I was raising my son, folding all the wash and getting dinner on the table. We&amp;#039;re not perfect. We&amp;#039;re a work in progress. But man, America has gotten a lot of things right. Traveling in bipartisan delegation is where I&amp;#039;ve been able to develop relationships. I don&amp;#039;t know that the same opportunities exist in the day-to-day grind. My son turned twenty-two yesterday. He got to cast his first vote for his mother for the House of Representatives. Isn&amp;#039;t that great? I might get up at 5:30 to get a glimpse of the newspaper online. Sometimes I&amp;#039;m home at 11 at night. I love it. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a8657/donna-edwards-interview-1110/>