Schwarzenegger Advisor: People Don't Trust Their Leaders

Matthew Dowd — the former Bush-Cheney 2004 chief political strategist who is now working for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger — is launching a new website Thursday called Hotsoup.com. For the unveiling, the website is promoting a survey of 5,600 people which reveals: Voters have little faith in elected officials.

"Frustrated with the nation's leadership, an overwhelming number of Hotsoup.com community Members say they turn to their peers for answers to big problems rather than political, business, or religious institutions," the Hotsoup.com apparatchik announced in a press release.

Presumably that leadership does not include his client, Schwarzenegger.

The survey was conducted on the "coming soon" page of the website even before the formal launch Thursday. Hotsoup.com was co-founded by veterans of the political establishment: Dowd; Ron Fournier, the former chief political writer for the Associated Press; Mark McKinnon, Bush's pollster; Joe Lockhart, former President Bill Clinton's press secretary; and various other Democratic, Republican and media consultants.

Although run by the establishment, the site claims that it "will turn the pathways of influence in this nation upside-down as community Members help rewrite the national agenda and leaders engage with their constituencies in new ways." In other words, this is more marketing research for politicians.

Good luck. Perhaps it will work. But they might stop capitalizing community "Members." Seems like something a political strategist from the "pathways of influence" would dream up.

(Photo: Freddie Lee / AP)