Matthew Dowd

Matthew John Dowd (born May 29, 1961, Detroit, Michigan) is an American political consultant who was the chief strategist for the Bush-Cheney '04 presidential campaign. In December 2007, he was introduced on ABC's Good Morning America as its new political contributor. He also appears on the same network's This Week with Christiane Amanpour.

Career

Dowd began his political career as a Democrat, working for, among others, Texas Lt. Governor Bob Bullock. In 1999, he switched parties to become a Republican.^[1]

During the 2002 election, Dowd was a senior adviser to the Republican National Committee.^{[citation needed]}

During the 2004 Presidential election, Dowd was chief strategist for George W. Bush's re-election campaign.^[1]

As reported in The New York Times on April 1, 2007, Dowd had come to feel a deep frustration with and great disappointment in George W. Bush, whom he criticized for failing to call the nation together in time of war, for ignoring the will of the American public with regard to the Iraq War, his re-nomination of former UN ambassador John Bolton after his rejected confirmation and for failing to hold Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld accountable for the Abu Ghraib scandal.^[2] According to Democracy Now, Dowd claims to have undergone a change of heart regarding the Iraq War, and adopted a position advocating a withdraw from that country, after contemplating the likelihood of his own son's deployment to the country, as well as after seeing Bush refuse to meet with anti-war-mother Cindy Sheehan in the summer of 2005, while he was entertaining Lance Armstrong at his ranch in Crawford, Texas. Dowd cited these incidents, as well as Bush's handling of the Hurricane Katrina disaster, as cause for this change.^[3][4]

Upon leaving the Bush administration, Dowd has not been on speaking terms with former White House political adviser Karl Rove.^[5] Sidney Blumenthal, in an opinion piece in Salon, entitled "Matthew Dowd's not-so-miraculous conversion", described Dowd as an "opportunist".^[6]

On December 2, 2010 Dowd penned an opinion piece in the National Journal defending Wikileaks, writing that, "Republicans and Democrats seem to agree on a few things: That the government, in the name of fighting terrorism, has the right to listen in on all of our phone conversations and read our e-mails, even if it has no compelling reason for doing so."^[7]

Bibliography

• Dowd, Matthew J., Ron Fournier, and Douglas B. Sosnik. "Applebee's America: How Successful Political, Business, and Religious Leaders Connect With the New American Community." New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006. Includes interviews with people whom the authors met at Applebee's restaurants.

References

1. ^ ^{a b} NPR: Matthew Dowd, "Turning Sour on Bush" NPR; December 31, 2008
2. ^ Peter Baker: A President Besieged and Isolated, Yet at Ease. Washington Post, July 2, 2007; Page A01
3. ^ "Key Bush Insider Speaks Out, Calls for Iraq Withdrawal". Democracy Now. 2007-04-02. http://www.democracynow.org/2007/4/2/headlines. Retrieved 2010-02-01. 
4. ^ Rutenberg, Jim. "Ex-Aide Says He’s Lost Faith in Bush" The New York Times, April 1, 2007
5. ^ Rutenberg, Jim (August 19, 2007). "Rove says it's Dems who are divisive / Outgoing Bush aide rejects blame from critics on both sides". The San Francisco Chronicle. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/08/19/MNVKRLCH2.DTL. 
6. ^ Matthew Dowd's not-so-miraculous conversion | Salon
7. ^ Dowd, Matthew, To Tell the Truth, Dec 2, 2010, nationaljournal.com, accessed Dec. 4, 2010

External links

• Excel spreadsheet with fees paid to Dowd by BC04
• Another copy of the Excel spreadsheet showing the $977 paid in fees and expenses paid to Dowd by BC04
• Dowd's 1993 donation to the campaign of Senator Lloyd Bentsen
• Dowd's page at the Web site for his company Vianovo
• FRONTLINE (PBS) interview with Matthew Dowd
• "Ex-Aide Says He’s Lost Faith in Bush" New York Times
• Dowd's ABCNews blog
• Matthew Dowd on Charlie Rose

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Name	Dowd, Matthew
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Date of birth	May 29, 1961
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