Bauer done with election, but not with political arena/ Former

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Apr 2, 2000 | by Mary Boyle

"Suffice to say, I made it clear I thought singling out two Christian right leaders was a mistake," Bauer said.

The McCain campaign asked Bauer to make quick changes, and Bauer added lines praising Dobson and Chuck Colson, a former Watergate felon who became a prison evangelist.

"I thought a logical way to counter the criticism of two individuals associated with that movement would have been to praise others associated with it," Bauer said.

Even today, Bauer makes no apology for McCain's speech, parts of which McCain later said he regretted.

"I thought it made a statement about Sen. McCain that he didn't in any way resist adding (the names of Dobson and Colson), even though neither man had endorsed him and Dobson had been relatively critical of him," Bauer said.

The future is uncertain

Bauer is not returning to the Family Research Council, the conservative advocacy group that he ran before hitting the campaign trail.

The decision had nothing to do with the endorsement controversy but with Bauer's desire to remain politically active. He acknowledged, though, that the controversy "probably lessened the enthusiasm of some people for me to go back."

Instead, Bauer plans to use his political action committee, Campaign for Working Families, and a small nonprofit group called American Values, as platforms to bring his ideas and values to the American public.

It remains to be seen, however, whether his friends and supporters will stand by him.

Bauer said he and Dobson, for example, have spoken several times since the controversy. But don't look for him to return to Dobson's popular daily radio broadcast anytime soon.

Focus spokesman Paul Hetrick said "some obvious questions" would likely have to be answered before Bauer would be invited back or be asked to write a guest column for one of the Focus publications.

"One would hope (the questions) could be resolved," Hetrick said. "But that may be too optimistic. I don't know."

Some supporters say they have been turned off.

David Schultheis of Colorado Springs, who donated $1,000 to Bauer's campaign last year, said he lost faith in Bauer even before the endorsement controversy.

Schultheis was critical of Bauer's handling of rumors - which Bauer denied - that he was having an extramarital affair with a female campaign staffer.

Two of Bauer's campaign workers resigned in protest of what they considered Bauer's "inappropriate" behavior in spending time alone with the young campaign manager. Such actions violate the strict rules that some Christian conservatives believe govern married men in their dealings with women.

Bauer held a news conference to deny an affair and suggested he was being held to standards that were too high.

"I am not a minister, I am not a pastor," Bauer said at the time.

Schultheis said Bauer should hold himself to the highest standard. In addition, he should not have spent time behind closed doors with the woman, a criticism echoed by other religious conservatives.

"He put himself in a situation he shouldn't have and showed judgment that wasn't good," Schultheis said.