A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius -- Not.

According to the ‘Bune’s Amany Ali, “Downtown has many needs.”

In her column today, Ali picks up where she left off some months back, when her idle speculation as to why old buildings downtown don’t get used for something was not followed by any journalistic effort in the general vein of “investigative reporting,” thus confirming yet again a pattern of intellectual laziness that is the hallmark of her newspaper and a long-term contributing factor in the perpetual dumbing-down of the enduring Banana Republic that is New Albany.

Today, Ali begins with the obvious: “Everybody seems to have an opinion about what would be that thing that would bring downtown New Albany back to life.”

Indeed they do.

Two chemical reactions masquerading as ideas that Ali has heard mentioned are bringing a Wal-Mart and/or a Cracker Barrel downtown. Both are reluctantly dismissed by the author, as she personally has nothing “bad” to say about Wal-Mart and in fact would be positioned first in line to eat at a downtown Cracker Barrel.

During all her years as City Editor, has Amany Ali ever allowed herself to be exposed to an idea without instinctively swatting it away as if it were an annoying gnat?

In the short three-month existence of NA Confidential, its readers have joined to debate the veracity of the “Creative Class” as described by Richard Powers, learned about the movement in Austin, Texas that has led to the “keeping things weird” philosophy of local business vs. chains, and considered locally branded “destination” businesses as anchors of downtown revitalization.

But in Ali’s world, none of these ideas are permitted to intrude upon the imperatives of unthinking, reflexive habit. Instead, she posits that Wal-Mart wouldn’t come downtown because there’s not enough physical space, and furthermore, everyone knows that Cracker Barrels only locate on highways – we might add, mostly in the “exurb,” although we can be sure that she doesn’t know to what supposed socio-cultural phenomenon columnist David Brooks’s coinage refers.

As a patriotic, undiscerning consumer, Ali knows that it would be nice to have a chain Payless shoe store downtown, as well as a health food store so she wouldn’t have to drive out to the fringe to the admittedly excellent chain Kroger to buy fat-free cottage cheese.

A chain health store, we presume, noting that she couldn't hink of one to use as an example. Whole Foods, perhaps?

The preceding is incredibly vapid … and yes, it gets worse.

“I can spend hours in a bookstore. And I loathe the traffic headaches involved in driving to Louisville-area bookstores. However, there was a time when I would put my life into the hands of crazy motorists just to drive to the Hawley-Cooke Booksellers on Shelbyville Road. That place is the greatest. I know I’m not the only person who would enjoy such a place. And it would only be accentuated by adding a coffee bar to the establishment.”

With this paragraph, Ali pole vaults across the line that separates her unwillingness to treat a serious topic with seriousness from the outright maliciousness of omission.

Let’s break it down, one sentence at a time.

“I can spend hours in a bookstore.”

Be careful – they keep ideas there, but no fly swatters.

“And I loathe the traffic headaches involved in driving to Louisville-area bookstores."

So do we all. That’s why we read, observe, work and learn in hopes of improving New Albany by bringing good things like bookstores right here to where we live.

“However, there was a time when I would put my life into the hands of crazy motorists just to drive to the Hawley-Cooke Booksellers on Shelbyville Road.”

Good. So, you really can see the positive aspects of an independent bookstore, as opposed to the anti-competitive chains that dominate the bookselling industry – to the detriment of us all (there are articles and books that explain this notion, should you care to read them).

“That place is the greatest.”

Is? IS? Try “was.” Borders (a chain bookstore) bought Hawley-Cooke out two years ago. Either it’s been a while between books, or you’re an Amazon shopper now.

Or both.

“I know I’m not the only person who would enjoy such a place.”

Perhaps, although you may be the only person who hasn’t noticed that New Albany has its own independent bookseller, Destinations, located just a few blocks up the street from where you utilize precious column inches to boast about your chain-store shopping habits, confess to your abject ignorance about the virtues of local flavor vs. chain store cookie-cutter, and ignore a plethora of urban redevelopment themes being applied throughout the United States that might help you understand what all this potentially means, and then – yes, there’s more – be able to do your job more competently by relaying the information to your readers.

“And it would only be accentuated by adding a coffee bar to the establishment.”

Of course it would, and we at NA Confidential agree that coffee and books are a great combination, but we also understand that an economic development plan based on trying to lure a Borders and a Starbucks downtown would if successful stand only to exacerbate the crippling disease from which New Albany already suffers, which is a lack of a unique identity, the sometimes belligerent absence of self-esteem that stems from it, and the lowest common denominator way of “thinking” that dooms us to mediocrity.

In other words, the disease that features so prominently in today's Tribune column by Amany Ali.

Yesterday, NA Confidential asked how the concept of intelligence manages to survive in a society that seems oddly determined to embrace unintelligence as its mantra.

Today, we’re more specific.

Why must we be forced to endure such a relentlessly stupid newspaper?