During tonight's Politico/ABC candidate forum in Virginia, Leon Harris asked Republican nominee Bob McDonnell about an interesting angle surrounding his thesis -- a right-wing manifesto that denounced working women as being detrimental to the family.

Harris pointed out that McDonnell's own ads have boasted that he was raised by a working mother. So how could the same man, at age 34, write a thesis denouncing working women?

"The thesis was about a 20, 30 year look at government policies and its impact on the family," said McDonnell. "It started with the premise that's been true from Kennedy to Reagan, and from Obama to McDonnell -- that family is the bedrock of society, and government should not do things that are detrimental to the family."

McDonnell discussed how his daughters have all pursued graduate degrees at his encouragement. "My oldest daughter, a platoon leader in Iraq," said McDonnell, "and Leon, I'd call that the ultimate working woman, supervising 25 men in Baghdad."

McDonnell was then asked about the Deeds' campaign's argument: That people can't trust McDonnell on social issues, because his bills in the legislature were themselves geared towards the ideas in the thesis.

"Well they didn't, and that's what's false about it," he responded. "This is a common attack that Democrats have levied at me, and frankly a lot of Republicans."

He said that only two percent of his bills were about abortion, on issues like banning partial-birth abortion and requiring parental consent for minors, and that they passed by wide margins. He further added that it's Deeds who is outside of the majority, by having not supported those measures.

"People know that I'm pro-life, pro-family, that shouldn't surprise anybody" said McDonnell. But he said that his campaign is focused on economic issues like jobs, infrastructure on other quality of life issues -- that it's Deeds who is running a campaign based on social issues, by attacking him for the thesis.

Ed. note: The quotes used here are rush transcriptions, and may be subject to later editing.