If you take a stroll around San Francisco's financial district you are surrounded by brands. Every morning, on my way to work, where I write marketing blurbs about beauty brands, I can't help but absorb bytes of brand-speak, which are constant reminders that today's world largely runs on perceptions—Peet's Coffee cups, tantalizing images of Cole Haan shoes, and all kinds of corporate messages saturate today's urban American experience. Given this environment perhaps it should come as no surprise, that the idea of the "American brand" has become commonly accepted parlance.

Even five years ago the Brand America "trademark" was becoming a legitimate entity.  In 2003 a San Francisco Chronicle article by James MacKinnon entitled, "Brand America," observed that: "It used to be a joke, and not a subtle one: America™, the world's greatest democracy reduced to a catchy trade name. Today 'Brand America' is used without embarrassment. Branding is the new federal mega-project."

Once you start to look for it, you will begin to see and hear evidence of a seismic identity shift in the popular conception of what America is, at its core.  We seem to be losing the conviction that we are citizens of a nation that warrants our deepest commitment of allegiance, and instead have come to see ourselves as voting shareholders of a corporate identity.  The foundation and essence of our nation—its embodied land and citizens, its common history, and its shared goods and values—have faded in to the background behind the emerging definition of America: a powerful, global transaction and marketing machine.

One such perspective makes up a premise for the book Brand America: The Mother of All Brands describing how, "America has become the largest and most powerful brand in the global marketplace," and how this leans in large part on its "branding attributes," namely: "sporting prowess, technological achievement, wealth, and definitive youth lifestyle."  The book likens the American brand to Guinness, Adidas, and Starbucks, all of which are called out as successful brands that have become "cultural icons" of sorts.

Allow me to point out the painfully obvious problem: America is not a product along the same lines as beer, athletic shoes, or coffee. Instead of the taste of an alcoholic beverage, or the comfort of peoples' feet being at stake, the American brand must deliver on the promises of safety, rights, and liberty. In our transaction-oriented outlook, we can get carried away with economic position-jockeying as we scramble to stay on the top of the tumultuous global heap. But is this approach causing us to overlook and undermine the history and foundation that have allowed our society to come to be in the first place?

Seeing America primarily as a brand brings about the disproportionate focus on America's distinctive benefits, while ignoring the unique moral vision from which those very benefits arise.  The cost-benefit analysis approach to what it means to be American is linked to the exaggerated fixation on individual rights and is depleting the energy necessary to tend the common vision of shared goods that secure those rights.

Our society was not built in a casual, detached manner.  We enjoy the freedom, opportunities, and rights available today because citizens before us committed to this place and its principles with the same conviction, passion, and depth that they dedicated to family, and churches—over and above fickle personal considerations.  But if we view our citizenship as something like a stock portfolio to be hedged, traded, and balanced, then who and what is to sustain the spirit and tradition of America?

A recent blog post from a market-positioning group noted the faltering status of the U.S. "mark." The blogger announces: “In recent years, while other countries’ brands have drastically improved, America’s brand has declined. A recent study shows America’s brand index as ranking 7th among all other major, developed nations.” Others put it even more bluntly: "America's global image is in the crapper," trumpets Jeff Yang in his Salon.com article, "Brand-aid." He goes on, "Last year, the BBC World Service conducted a poll of over 26,000 individuals in the world's 25 largest countries and found that more than 52 percent thought the U.S. had a 'mostly negative' influence on the world."

So what do the shareholders say to feedback like this? We seem to be behind in the popularity contest. Number seven isn't even a medal contender! Who is in the top three? Can I buy their stock instead? This is a striking departure from the example set by our nation's veterans—those who we celebrate this week for their dedication and sacrifices that have provided us with safety and privileges we depend on daily, often without a second thought.

It seems that if our national identity flattens out to the black, white, and gray of transactional interaction, we will have very little red, white, and blue left in us. Our songs of "God Bless America" will strike us as out-of-tune and obsolete. Such vestiges of an enthusiastic and loyal relationship with this unique nation could simply pass into humiliated oblivion, in an era of Patriocide—unless we recover and invest our lives in the deep moral vision upon which America stands, and gratefully remember the men and women who have brought it to life.

World Marks 90th Anniversary of WWI

People across the United States, Europe and Australia are marking the 90th anniversary Tuesday of the end of World War I, the first major war of the 20th century.

In London, three of the last surviving British veterans of the conflict (all of them over 100 years old) led a ceremony to commemorate the moment in 1918 when the armistice treaty was signed. The treaty brought an end to the so-called "war to end all wars" on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

In the United States, the holiday known as Veterans Day commemorates the millions of Americans who have served in the military, including in all of the nation's military conflicts, up to the present day.

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Patriotism
by Alexis de Tocqueville (1805 - 1859)

There is one sort of patriotic attachment which principally arises from that instinctive, disinterested, and undefinable feeling which connects the affections of man with his birthplace. This natural fondness is united with a taste for ancient customs and a reverence for traditions of the past; those who cherish it love their country as they love the mansion of their fathers. They love the tranquility that it affords them; they cling to the peaceful habits that they have contracted within its bosom; they are attached to the reminiscences that it awakens; and they are even pleased by living there in a state of obedience. This patriotism is sometimes stimulated by religious enthusiasm, and then it is capable of making prodigious efforts. It is in itself a kind of religion: it does not reason, but it acts from the impulse of faith and sentiment. In some nations the monarch is regarded as a personification of the country; and, the fervor of patriotism being converted into the fervor of loyalty, they take a sympathetic pride in his conquests, and glory in his power. power was a time under the ancient monarchy when the French felt a sort of satisfaction in the sense of their dependence upon the arbitrary will of their king; and they were wont to say with pride: "We live under the most powerful king in the world."

But, like all instinctive passions, this kind of patriotism incites great transient exertions, but no continuity of effort. It may save the state in critical circumstances, but often allows it to decline in times of peace. While the manners of a people are simple and its faith unshaken, while society is steadily based upon traditional institutions whose legitimacy has never been contested, this instinctive patriotism is wont to endure.

But there is another species of attachment to country which is more rational than the one I have been describing. It is perhaps less generous and less ardent, but it is more fruitful and more lasting: it springs from knowledge; it is nurtured by the laws, it grows by the exercise of civil rights; and, in the end, it is confounded with the personal interests of the citizen. A man comprehends the influence which the well-being of his country has upon his own; he is aware that the laws permit him to contribute to that prosperity, and he labors to promote it, first because it benefits him, and secondly because it is in part his own work.

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