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Has 'War' become a leading brand for United States?
How Bush's imperial policies are being linked to economic woes and CEO angst in America

We hear a lot about the government largesse flowing toward Halliburton, Bechtel and a handful of other favored firms chosen to rebuild Iraq. Less often do we consider the possibility that the administration's bellicosity has been a major business blunder....

...If Bush is an oil president, he's not a Disney president, nor a Coca-Cola one. If Vice President Dick Cheney is working diligently to help Halliburton rebound, the war he helped lead hasn't worked out nearly so well for Starbucks.

A year ago, Jim Lobe of Inter Press Service reported on a survey of 8,000 international consumers released by Global Market Institute Inc. of Seattle. The survey noted that "one-third of all consumers in Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, Russia and the United Kingdom said that U.S. foreign policy, particularly the war on terror and the occupation of Iraq, constituted their strongest impression of the United States."

"Unfortunately, current American foreign policy is viewed by international consumers as a significant negative, when it used to be a positive," said Mitchell Eggers, Global Market's chief operating officer and chief pollster.

Brands the survey identified as particularly at risk included Marlboro, America Online, McDonald's, American Airlines, Exxon Mobil, Chevron, United Airlines, Budweiser, Chrysler, Mattel, Starbucks and General Motors.

In past months, a litany of stories in the financial press featured unnerving questions for business. Typical were the Financial Times in August ("World Turning Its Back on Brand America") and Forbes in September ("Is Brand America In Trouble?").

A U.S. Banker magazine article in August relaying the results of an Edelman Trust Barometer survey found that 41 percent of Canadian opinion leaders were less likely to purchase American products because of Bush administration policies, compared with 56 percent in the United Kingdom, 61 percent in France, 49 percent in Germany and 42 percent in Brazil.

It's not just snooty foreigners who are negative, either. American business leaders have been starting to link economic woes to imperial policy. The U.S. Banker article warned, the "majority of American CEOs, whose firms employ 8 million overseas, are now acknowledging that anti-American sentiment is a problem." ...

...In June 2004, USA Today reporter James Cox wrote about how financially ailing companies are pointing to the war as the culprit: "Hundreds of companies blame the Iraq war for poor financial results in 2003, many warning that continued U.S. military involvement there could harm this year's performance. In recent regulatory filings at the Securities and Exchange Commission, airlines, home builders, broadcasters, mortgage providers, mutual funds and others directly blame the war for lower revenues and profits last year."

Among those complaining was Hewlett-Packard, which claimed that the occupation of Iraq has created uncertainty and hurt its stock price.

While fingering the war might just be a convenient excuse for some underperforming executives, the level of grumbling is noteworthy, as are the comments of outspoken fund managers profiled by Cox. "The war in Iraq created a quagmire for corporations," David Galvan, a portfolio manager for Wayne Hummer Income Fund, says in his letter to shareholders. Vintage Mutual Funds concludes that "the price of these commitments (in Iraq and Afghanistan) may be more than the American public had expected or is willing to tolerate."

In an SEC filing, Domenic Colasacco, manager of the Boston Balanced Fund, calls the U.S. occupation "sad and increasingly risky." ...