Your capital is under attack and you need to protect it.  What do we mean by this?  Well, capital is thought of in many different contexts:  the capital of a state or nation where the primary seat of government is located;  financial capital which is any form of wealth capable of being employed in production;  we hear the term emotional capital used more recently to refer to feelings or goodwill one attaches to a brand, person or product;  similarly, political capital is based on a public figure's favorable image and influence among his or her constituents and other leaders.

The word capital comes from the Latin capitalis or "of the head", hence "capital, chief, or first".  So, do we mean that your head is under attack?  Well, yes, in many ways that's exactly what we mean.  We'll get back to making that case but let's talk more about how all these other forms of capital are under attack.

The attacks come, as they always have in two forms:  direct taxation and inflation.  Now most people can easily think in terms of financial capital, the kind of capital that is important to individuals.  We don't always admit it but having more financial capital is what much of our daily activity is aimed at.  It's easy to see when someone is trying to just take money from us and not that big a leap to see when our government takes more of our capital by raising taxes but it's more abstract to see how our capital gets attacked by inflation.  Even then, most people can feel the pinch of inflation when prices of things they need go up for no apparent reason.  We think, "my dollars don't go as far as they used to" or "it takes more to live the way I want to live".

But what do we mean when we say your capital, as in the nation's capital or my state's capital, is under attack?  Well, our nation's capital is Washington DC and we don't really think of it being under physical attack, at least not since Sept 11.  But we know that the ideas have changed, that there's a sort of intellectual or cultural attack that's been occurring for decades.  Academics, bureaucrats and especially power hungry politicians have been attacking our capital for decades.  We watch these people who generally have no clear understanding of government's proper role nor of the constitution they swear to defend.  Think about how often people who want to go to Washington to represent you deride "Washington" itself.  Why do they do this?  They capitalize on you knowing there is something wrong there but not being able to truly identify the source of what is actually wrong.  It's simply a tragedy that we now use the term "Washington" to refer to incompetence at best and something ugly, corrupt and malicious at worst.  Our capital's name, obviously comes from the respect and admiration we had for our first president, a man who was in spirit and in action quite the opposite of these derisive terms.  The general, farmer, statesman and president George Washington embodied character, leadership, strength and honesty.  Of course, there are those who claim that this is all a myth, that Washington, like all the founders, was a fallible human being and they go on to list his supposed flaws.  Well, Washington is under attack - both Washington the man and Washington, DC our capital.

How about your emotional capital?  Are your feelings about brands - the goodwill you attach to America, our history and our constitution - are these under attack, too?