[gdbsjjdn]

The "crystals and horoscopes" part is such a cheap jab that's going to alienate a lot of the population. Astrology is a harmless introspective process for most people, they just like having a framework to characterise their beliefs and feelings. You find very few people who feel that it's prescriptive and limits their life.

Contrasted with very rational people who are chasing magical, unmoored valuations in the stock market for instance. We buy and sell equity based not on future cash flows, but on confidence there will be a bigger sucker down the line. This untethering of "value" from any productive work is a greater contributor to the hollowing out of the US economy than anyone buying a piece of amethyst.

[layer8]

The “clutching” and “nervously consulting” is essential here. It’s where it has stopped being a “harmless introspective process”.

Apart from that, I read “crystals” and “horoscopes” in a more metaphorical sense here.

[gdbsjjdn]

The verbs are not the issue. America has been hollowed out by political propaganda, offshoring and growing wealth inequality. Sagan fails to identify any of these and instead dunks on harmless folk superstitions. Show me where the Fed rate or IBM's quarterly earnings or a Fox News chyron were determined by a horoscope.

The real enemy is the belief that value can be created from nothing, such that an economy of infinite growth can exist. Once you've exhausted all the externalities - exploiting people overseas, domestically, pillaging natural resources - you're left in a zero sum game.

[twisteriffic]

> Sagan fails to identify any of these and instead dunks on harmless folk superstitions. Show me where the Fed rate or IBM's quarterly earnings or a Fox News chyron were determined by a horoscope.

It's in the same paragraph...

> I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time — when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority

[gdbsjjdn]

Yeah he correctly identifies the outcome, but like I said he misattributes the cause. And his rhetoric is not helpful in getting "common people" around to his cause. It comes across as elitist and condescending.