Dear George,

I'm not sure why Creigh [Deeds] has not yet responded to the GBLT questions you asked. It could be that his handlers feel that if he can skip around them he won't lose votes in the more conservative parts of the 25th. Neither this set of questions, nor any of the other sets, were meant to be "gotchas" but went to the heart of the concerns of many loyal Democrats.

Gays will vote on as broad a range of issues as any of us, but, also like every other self-identified group, want to know how a legislator will respond to issues uniquely important to them.

We like to think of the Democratic Party as a big tent, but that only works when folks who want our votes do not hide their views about important issues in a closet.

Al Weed (electronic mail, November 20, 2001).