Good question. Virginia Haussegger writes in The Age, "the collective answer seems to be: she's a powerful, sexy little fox who's smart, witty, made it to the top and has got it all sewn up. She's a bitch."

Actually, Haussegger is a quite a fan and her column is a rant about the shabby treatment Dowd's new book has been getting in the pages of Australia's newspapers.  Dowd arrives Down Under tomorrow for a week-long book tour. 

While we're on the subject, here's Dowd in this morning's NY Times:

Maybe it's corporate racial profiling, but I don't want foreign companies, particularly ones with links to 9/11, running American ports.

What kind of empire are we if we have to outsource our coastline to a group of sheiks who don't recognize Israel, in a country where money was laundered for the 9/11 attacks? And that let A. Q. Kahn, the Pakistani nuclear scientist, smuggle nuclear components through its port to Libya, North Korea and Iran?

It's mind-boggling that President Bush ever agreed to let an alliance of seven emirs be in charge of six of our ports. Although, as usual, Incurious George didn't even know about it until after the fact. (Neither did Rummy, even though he heads one of the agencies that green-lighted the deal.)

Same old pattern: a stupid and counterproductive national security decision is made in secret, blowing off checks and balances, and the president's out of the loop. [snip]

As part of the lunatic White House defense, Dan Bartlett argued that "people are trying to drive wedges and make this to be a political issue." But as the New Republic editor Peter Beinart pointed out in a recent column, W. has made the war on terror "one vast wedge issue" to divide the country.

Now, however, the president has pulled us together. We all pretty much agree: mitts off our ports.

Dowd is the perfect expression of the rank hypocrisy and craven opportunism liberals are showing on the port issue (Harold Meyerson provides another good example). As Michelle Malkin writes today, "They're all profilers now." Next thing you know Dowd will be following in the footsteps of Senator Schumer and singing the praises of Halliburton as the answer to our port security prayers.