The following letter is from Arlington County Treasurer Frank O'Leary. It follows a series of events that is fully recounted here, so no need to repeat it.
Dear Friends and Supporters:While I have apologized sincerely and profusely to the citizens of Arlington and, in particular, the African-American community for my stupid remark concerning minority churches that seems to have triggered this firestorm; I have failed to apologize to the people who mean the most to me - my friends and supporters. You all went to bat for me, in various ways, and I let you down by allowing my temper to get away from me, in reaction to Bob?s attack piece, and I did a dumb thing. Many of you have said that the current reaction of the truly self-righteous is grossly disproportionate to the offense and you may be right. What is certain, however, is that I and I alone provided them the opportunity. I apologize to all of you, most particularly my wife Linda and cousin-in-law Mariel, for what I have caused and the embarrassment and stress that you may have suffered.
Take care,
Frank
I'm glad to see this from Frank, and hope that the situation will now improve.
In the end, we are all human. We all say things we later regret at one time or another. His letter did seem sincere.