Fortress America
Becomes Fortress Trump
When friends comes to visit me, I always take them on a walk from here at the top of Windmill Hill, down Warren Street all the way to the river. It is an extraordinarily difficult gauntlet to run, given the irresistible shop windows on every single block. A couple of days ago, while enjoying this walk with my friend Krisztina from Budapest, STAIR Gallery had its “AUCTION PREVIEW” sandwich board on the sidewalk, to announce its upcoming auction The Fortress: 500 Years of Furniture and Decorative Arts. Bringing together sumptuous objects spanning five centuries, from the Italian Renaissance through the Baroque and William and Mary periods, the auction takes its name from The Fortress, a Troy architectural treasure that has been home since 2007 to NYC antiques dealers Antonie Reinhard and Maurice Margules.
Having been the principle theater for: the 75–year conflict oddly christened the “French & Indian Wars”; the American Revolution; and the War of 1812, the Hudson Valley has innumerable architectural, landscape, and toponymic relics of its military past, which only occasionally come into public consciousness at the time of commemorative anniversary celebrations. While our regional landscape holds the memory of these conflicts, with each generation, they fade further and further from forming our character, our culture, and our civitas.
Stepping into the Fortress arcade at STAIR – replete with both beautiful artifacts radiating domestic harmony, plenty, and tranquility and the occasional reminder of martial conflict – brought palpably home how we dwell simultaneously within cornucopious Columbia, the ample–bosomed goddess of American peace and plenty, and the fractious empire of Fortress America, which every day increasingly transforms into Fortress Trump, a cruelly vicious, heavily–armed, predatory power overlain by an increasingly thin veneer of TV–phony performative politeness.
There is nothing like the visit of a gentle and genteel European friend to one’s hometown to jolt one into awareness of our sleepy imperial existence. The day after Krisztina toured the auction gallery, President Donald Trump crazily convened the first meeting of his new UN–replacing, Kabuki entity, the “Board of Peace.” The same day, the Donald’s smug mug went up on a huge banner hung from the columns at the Department of Justice. Friends, if you have not read my little chapbook “The Bully,” please take a glance, as it draws the necessary historic parallel that all too few Trump–watchers have noticed.
By this time next week, Fortress America may again be at war with Iran, as the lunatic bully continues to destroy any remnants of national and international dignity and sanity. Surely it is time to come out from our safe little domestic fortresses to join our hearts and minds to stand against tyranny, as many of our brave fellow citizens have been doing. Take heart, dear neighbors, take hands, and step out onto whatever frontier of courage lies before you.
