What kept me up last night

Well, it was already pretty late when I went to bed last night/morning, but I just wanted to read twenty pages of my book, get on up to that nice P.125.

So I stayed up even later, because I kept going "what? that... that doesn't necessarily follow... hold on, I've gotta write this down so I can mention it later..."

I'm kind of thinking that I should accept that I feel pretty much the opposite of what these guys are saying.

Rebel Sell P.108

"There is only one problem: (the theory that the consumer can disrupt the system simply by refusing to shop where she has been told to) is based upon an elementary fallacy. There is no such thing as generalized overproduction. Never was, never has been.
No modern economist, left or right, endorses Marx's claim that capitalism is subject to rises of underproduction... theories like Baudrillard's and Ewen's continue to circulate and are taken seriously, even though they are based upon the academic equivalent of an urban myth."

Well that was rude. The author's proof that generalized overproduction is impossible is on the following page:

"Although we sell goods in return for money, the money itself is not consumed; we simply use it in order to purchase other goods from other people. As a result, the supply of goods constitutes the demand for other goods. Total supply and total demand always add up to the same amount, simply because they are the same thing, seen from two different perspectives."

This strikes me as an incredibly simplistic and inaccurate argument (and when I say it's too simplistic an argument, that's saying something, as someone who appreciates a straightforward argument)

They use the example of a barter system world to try and avoid the complications that money creates, with a man that makes shoes. "If I am to sustain my shoe operation, I will need to exchange the finished product for food, shelter, clothing, and all of the other necessities of life."

But see, if this were an analogy resembling anything like real life, there would be some consideration for when the man gets goods on the promise of shoes yet to be made.

And then say he can't make those future shoes.

Not a straight exchange, therefore an imbalance.

And how about if we re-enter the complicated world of money: a product gets marked up, and someone far removed from the common man will reap the rewards, earning far more than could reasonably get spent. How does one spend upwards of $30 million? You can't. It ends up translated to a higher society, where you buy exclusive, prohibitively expensive clothes and homes and vacations. Where you pay for the item itself, and then the priviledge of buying that particular kind of item.

How is that supposed to trickle down?

Ah, I'm getting off topic a bit... man, I'm tired, I don't want to put down any more quotations right now. Maybe tomorrow or something.

I was e-mailing a friend of mine and was going to mention that I drank a ton of water last night and today (resulting in many a bathroom trip) in an effort to help my winter dry skin.
I stopped myself: is this gross? Is this something unacceptable to talk about?

How should I know? I figured lets be safe and erase it.