Musings on a NY Primary Tuesday 6/28

i know there are some elections today that matter, but I don't know if there is one where I live.  Good thing it is only 1 1/2 blocks away and I will just walk by and see if I should be voting.  Of course, I won't know the candidates and will be voting blindly.  Since I am a political junkie, what does that imply about the voters who are not and on what basis do they vote?

David Brooks analyzes how culture affects people and can influence how they vote.  It is a complex analysis focused on the thoughts of J.D. Vance's new book, Hillbilly Elegy.  I think I will download it on my Nook for a read and I hope the Democrats do too.  They need to be competitive with white male voters who are not cultural elites.

I now quote David Brooks who in these words trashes both the Kardashians and Talk Radio.

"But the honor code has also been decimated by the culture of the modern meritocracy, which awards status to the individual who works with his mind, and devalues the class of people who work with their hands."

"Most of all, it has been undermined by rampant consumerism, by celebrity culture, by reality-TV fantasies that tell people success comes in a quick flash of publicity, not through steady work. The sociologist Daniel Bell once argued that capitalism would undermine itself because it encouraged hedonistic short-term values for consumers while requiring self-disciplined long-term values in its workers. At least in one segment of society, Bell was absolutely correct."

"There’s now a rift within the working class between mostly older people who are self disciplined, respectable and, often, bigoted, and parts of a younger cohort that are more disordered, less industrious, more celebrity-obsessed, but also more tolerant and open to the world."

Link to Brook's column, well worth reading

Meanwhile, one GOP senator is preventing the EXIM Bank from approving financings over $10 mm and forcing capital intensive manufacturers to expand abroad rather than in the U.S.A.  So no one should wonder why Donald Trump did well in GOP primaries.  He understands the need for financing and can communicate that to people angry about their kids not finding good employment in their community.

And lastly, NASA is about to have a satellite orbit Jupiter and discover things about that mysterious planet.  Would the Tea Party support NASA, or the CDC, or the NIH?  Do they even believe in science as a true depiction of Noah's Arc is being opened in Kentucky by the Creationist Museum, which has dinosaurs present with early people.