Thanks for stopping by, Allan. There's always a danger posting when one should be sleeping.

By quoting that Veblen piece in response, aren't you more or less evincing a preference of engineering or value-production over cultural production?

I wouldn't put it that way. It's merely an observation of the underlying unity between the multiple and ambiguous purposes at play (art for art's sake? self-promotion? propaganda?) and its continuity with other forms of cultural production.