Leadership Lecture Series - 2/28/2003
Mary Matalin
Matalin has served in many capacities during her career, both in government and with the Republican National Committee. She has hosted television and radio talk shows including Crossfire. Matalin hosted her own three-hour afternoon radio program on the CBS Talk Radio Network. The Mary Matalin Show highlighted current events, featured distinguished guests and listener calls. She has written for various publications including Newsweek and The Los Angeles Times. Matalin co-authored the best seller All’s Fair: Love, War, and Running for President with husband, James Carville.
Matalin has been active in politics since college, starting at the grassroots level in local and statewide campaigns in her native Illinois. The Reagan Revolution brought her to Washington, DC where she served the Republican National Committee in the Political Education, Redistricting, and Deputy Chairman offices.
Working for the RNC in 1984, Matalin held the position of Voter Contact Director for the Reagan-Bush Campaign. Following the campaign, she worked in the Public Affairs Office for President Reagan’s Inaugural. As part of the George Bush for President Campaign, she was the Deputy Political Director and Midwest Regional Political Director in the primary and served as National Victory ’88 Director in the general campaign. In 1992, she was named by President Bush as the Deputy Campaign Manager for Political Operations. She most recently served as Assistant to President George W. Bush and as Counselor to the Vice President.
James Carville
James Carville is
America’s best-known political consultant. His long list of electoral successes
evidences a knack for steering overlooked campaigns to unexpected landslide
victories and for remaking political underdogs into upset winners.
Carville’s winning streak began when he managed the gubernatorial victory of Robert Casey in Pennsylvania. In 1987, Carville helped Wallace Wilkinson win a hard-fought gubernatorial campaign in Kentucky. The following year brought Carville to New Jersey and then Georgia. He has managed campaigns for U. S. Senate seats as well as gubernatorial and presidential races.
Following the Clinton campaign, Carville began to focus on foreign consulting. Since that time, his political clients have included candidates in Greece, Brazil, Honduras, Ecuador, United Kingdom, Argentina, Mexico, Trinidad and Tobago, the Dominican Republic and Isreal.
He is an author, speaker, restaurateur, and talk show host. With his wife, Mary Matalin, he co-wrote All’s Fair: Love, War, and Running for President. Carville co-hosts CNN’s Crossfire.