Anyone who wants to know how far the GLBT community has come in the past 40 years need only tune in to the Logo television network Aug. 9.

There they’ll see most of the Democratic candidates for president, including the ones given the best chances of winning the White House next year, answering questions from gay and lesbian panelists about issues of importance to GLBT people.

Think about it. In June this newspaper interviewed a group of gay and lesbian seniors who recalled how, just 40 years ago, bars that catered to GLBTs were routinely raided and how people’s lives were ruined when news of their arrests for being in gay bars was published in the daily newspapers. Often those raids were led by politicians who used them to curry favor with the largely homophobic electorate.

And just a decade and a half ago, the most we expected from a presidential candidate was that he would actually meet with our community’s leaders publicly, and we were positively thrilled to get a few openly gay appointees to mid-level jobs in a president’s administration.

Now every Democratic candidate openly supports civil unions and two of them go all the way and favor marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples.

We’ve come a long way, and this presidential forum on GLBT issues is historic and will rightly be remembered as a milestone in our struggle for equal rights.

That said, it’s important to listen carefully to the candidates when they answer the questions posed to them. For starters, while we want marriage equality instead of civil unions, we need to hear Clinton, Edwards, Obama and the rest explain exactly what they mean when they say they support civil unions.

Does that mean they’ll do everything in their power to make sure that the federal government recognizes civil unions granted by the states? As president, will they direct the IRS to give gay and lesbian partners in civil unions the same tax breaks given to straight married couples? Will they push for federal recognition that bi-national gay and lesbian couples in civil unions and marriages deserve to be treated the same way that bi-national straight couples are treated?

What about the military? Why not just issue an executive order as commander-in-chief that ends discrimination based on sexual orientation in the military and dare Congress to override it? Will they go before the American people if necessary and passionately defend the right of gay and lesbian Americans to serve their country?

What about foreign policy and GLBT issues? Will they speak out against abuses against GLBTs in other countries? Will they back those words up with action in the most egregious cases?

What about HIV/AIDS? Will they undertake a renewed effort to cut the HIV infection rates among gay and bisexual men, still by far the most affected group in this country, by funding realistic programs that rely on science, not religious bigotry, to reach people with effective prevention messages? Are they willing to buck the corporate lobbyists and support meaningful healthcare reform that recognizes that a U.S. health system that spends two or three times as much per capita on healthcare as most countries but continues to fall behind those countries needs to be completely overhauled?

Remember—one of these candidates could well be president until 2016. That’s a long time. So listen closely and choose wisely.