WHAT?

Do I need to say this? On the one hand, according to the President, the "American taxpayers" are supposed to want tax dollars to go to companies based in the U.S. and allied countries.

On the other hand, companies from foreign countries can get in on the action through subcontracting anyway. See this story on Netzeitung about how German companies are not particularly worried about the issue because they are expecting to get into Iraq through the subcontracting process. See also here ("Despite Boycott, German Companies Are Counting on Contracts.") Deutsche Welle is carrying the same story. How are the "American taxpayers" supposed to feel about that?

So President Bush is going to get criticized by the mythical "American taxpayer" because of the subcontracting process anyway. The President apparently is concerned about this issue, but he hasn't avoided it with the new policy; American tax dollars are still going to go to "foreign companies."

Aside from revealing a lack of coordination among the administration (coordination is the President's job, folks!), the boycott ticks off countries from whom we freely acknowledge we need help without actually avoiding the problem that the President says the policy is supposed to accomplish. Seems to me like symbolic politics more than anything else. Worse, it's symbolic politics executed poorly, with respect to the very issue (war in Iraq) that the administration has made into one of its defining moments. Oh well.

I'm also a little worried about the extent to which this row obscures the fact that companies are not easily identified with a particular company anyway. Let's just say that Daimler-Chrysler had something it could bid on. Would they count?

The administration has managed to pursue a divisive and essentially contentless policy here. A neat trick. Unfortunate, though.

See also Jim at OTB here and here, and Josh at Oxblog, for administration allies who are puzzled by the policy. See also Kevin Drum.

MORE: The non-reaction of German companies also pretty much shoots down Jonah Goldberg's throw-me-a-lifeline "Jim Baker leverage" theory:

Isn't it possible that the stiffing of Germany, France and Russia is simply prelude to Jim Baker's Iraqi debt-cancellation world tour? It just seems so obvious to me now. He wanted some leverage and to send these countries a signal that we could play hardball before he left. It's fine with me as a policy or as a negotiating ploy.

What are we going to offer foreign countries? Money's not on the table; Germany's companies know this already.

Again, oh well.

MORE: Above, I should have said: "Money's not not on the table; German companies know this already."