America as planetary policeman: "When an entire political establishment says a decision is mad, I tend to think something in it must be right."

From the very inception of this blog in 2004, our credo has remained consistent.

New Albany is a state of mind … but whose? Since 2004, we’ve been observing the contemporary scene in this slowly awakening old river town. If it’s true that a pre-digital stopped clock is right twice a day, when will New Albany learn to tell time?

Neither Jeff Gahan nor Donald Trump are right very often, but the law of averages as symbolized by NAC's stopped pre-digital clock suggests both occasionally will stumble on truth by accident.

As such, Trump's assertion that "the United States cannot continue to be policeman to the world," while lost amid the clamor of his Mexican wall boneheadedness, is worthy of examination and support. This British fellow explains.

Trump has a point – the world should start solving its own problems, by Simon Jenkins (The Guardian)

For all his antics on the Mexican border, the US president is right to be withdrawing troops from Syria

 ... when an entire political establishment says a decision is mad, I tend to think something in it must be right. Thus with Trump’s announcement last month that he was pulling America’s 2,000 troops out of Syria. “They’re all coming back, and they’re coming back now,” he tweeted emphatically. That he could do this after an amiable chat with Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and without telling his commanders, was staggering.

Trump’s argument is that getting out of America’s wars was a campaign pledge. The Syrian intervention was never meant to be permanent and had already crippled Isis. “People are going to have to start doing a lot of their own work,” he added, “because the United States cannot continue to be policeman to the world” ...

Going deeper:

Trump is entitled to put “America first” in the Middle East, and that slogan may explain his trade barriers against Canada and China. But like the Mexican wall, such policies have nothing to do with America’s national security. The US must be the safest country on the planet. Its home territory has never been so much as menaced by a foreign power, let alone invaded. Two oceans protect it east and west. 9/11 aside, terrorist incidents have been homegrown. Wars abroad, from Vietnam to Syria, have reflected some neo‑imperial hegemonic urge, similar to that which used to grip Britain. The effect has been to turn the US from policeman to random vigilante.

The politics of fear has long been the default mode of the insecure statesman. The parading of military muscle still permeates the US’s public realm and has become a shop window for what President Eisenhower termed the anti-democratic “military-industrial complex”. Its endless aggrandisement boosts military spending and upholds the cause of an American presence across the globe. It worships daily at the altar of national security.

American aid to Nato has long underpinned Europe’s security, but that does not undermine Trump’s challenge, that the rest of the world should start solving its own problems ...

Is it the Onion? News and Tribune? NA Confidential? Nah, it's just a Duggins-ism, 'cuz "New Albany approves bid to transform alley into 'more of a place.'"

It's getting creepy surreal, for real. 

Make no mistake: We're honored to have been the source of this idea (June of 2915, below), along with the inimitable David Thrasher, and even if neither of us will be getting a plaque.

Thrasher deserves all the credit, eh?

There's just one lingering question. Given the impact of a typical Ohio Valley summer's night, is covering those dumpsters going to be enough?

Wait -- we already asked this question, a year and a half ago. We like being prescient, especially when they don't know what the word means.

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June 12, 2015
Seattle alleys, New Albany street pianos and the overdue purging of bureaucrats.

Photo credit: Hannegan Roseberry at Fb

I generally advocate thinking outside our self-imposed civic boxes, because New Albany has far too many of them, stacked somewhere out in the garage, creased and dusty, and filled with hoary rationales for non-activity that we've forgotten even exist.

We also have many suitable alleys, as outlined in is adaptive reuse saga from Seattle.

Seattle's Future Alleys Look Like Paradise, by John Metcalfe (City Lab)

When you peer into a downtown Seattle alley, you might see rats and people sleeping in dumpsters. That could change, however, as the city plans to turn some of these airless holes into charming, plant-filled utopias.

Against all odds, New Albany has a thriving restaurant and bar culture to consider, and consequently, while excitedly reading about alley renovations in Seattle -- and recalling the many "hidden" infrastructure places we possess in addition to these -- one sensation kept coming back to me.

Namely, the smell of dumpsters behind restaurants in a red-hot, humid Indiana summer. However, using spaces, making places ... I support the idea, and the possibilities are endless. In fact, apart from alleyways, we could do so much better here, and the first step simply must be liberating ourselves from thinking that the usual suspects and their same "officially" accredited agencies, commissions and political entities possess a monopoly on creativity.

They don't, and all too often they stifle grassroots artistic expression, placemaking and neighborhood revitalization.

As Hannegan Roseberry's experience with our gatekeepers at the Board of Works earlier this week illustrates, the cultural asphyxiation starts at the very top. Hannegan had an idea, and the bored's political appointees could barely stifle their yawns while flashing the usual reply: "It's not an option."

 ... Now, you may be wondering what this surely controversial project must be, considering the absolute breakdown of communication and complete avoidance it inspired: A street piano, painted brightly by teenage artists, sitting out on the street for all passersby to enjoy and experience. I know, contain your gasps of horror; the audacity of this citizen, to think she could so arrogantly prep a whimsical and creative project such as this and terrorize the streets of New Albany.

In all seriousness, my goal is to shed light on a far more concerning challenge than the fun and frivolity of a street piano: The piano is really beside the point.

New Albany must make government more accessible. It is absolutely inexcusable that a citizen with an idea and a passion for her community could be so absolutely and completely led in circles, shut out and shut down.

Tuesday mornings, 10 a.m. It's in need of a dose of glasnost.

Look it up, Warren.