Oct 11, 2009

San Felipe de Neri Church (Symmetry Style) -Schmap Winner!!!!

San Felipe de Neri Church (Symmetry Style)

San Felipe de Neri Church (Symmetry Style)

Hi Trent Rock's Visual Vices,

I am delighted to let you know that your submitted photo has been selected for inclusion in the newly released ninth edition of our Schmap Albuquerque Guide:

San Felipe de Neri Church
San Felipe de Neri Church


Aug 2, 2009

Bert's Burger Bowl Santa Fe, NM

Berts Burger Bowl Santa Fe, NM

www.roadfood.com/Restaurant/Reviews/1379/berts-burger-bowl

www.foodnetwork.com/diners-drive-ins-and-dives/all-kinds-...

Guy Fieri tracks down fast food done right: In NM, a 54 year old drive-in that s legendary for Green Chile Cheeseburgers

Trent likes green chile!!!

Jul 30, 2009

The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits

The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits
by Milton Friedman

The New York Times Magazine, September 13, 1970. When I hear businessmen speak eloquently about the "social responsibilities of business in a free-enterprise system," I am reminded of the wonderful line about the Frenchman who discovered at the age of 70 that he had been speaking prose all his life. The businessmen believe that they are defending free en­terprise when they declaim that business is not concerned "merely" with profit but also with promoting desirable "social" ends; that business has a "social conscience" and takes seriously its responsibilities for providing em­ployment, eliminating discrimination, avoid­ing pollution and whatever else may be the catchwords of the contemporary crop of re­formers. In fact they are–or would be if they or anyone else took them seriously–preach­ing pure and unadulterated socialism. Busi­nessmen who talk this way are unwitting pup­pets of the intellectual forces that have been undermining the basis of a free society these past decades.

The discussions of the "social responsibili­ties of business" are notable for their analytical looseness and lack of rigor. What does it mean to say that "business" has responsibilities? Only people can have responsibilities. A corporation is an artificial person and in this sense may have artificial responsibilities, but "business" as a whole cannot be said to have responsibilities, even in this vague sense. The first step toward clarity in examining the doctrine of the social responsibility of business is to ask precisely what it implies for whom.

Presumably, the individuals who are to be responsible are businessmen, which means in­dividual proprietors or corporate executives. Most of the discussion of social responsibility is directed at corporations, so in what follows I shall mostly neglect the individual proprietors and speak of corporate executives.

In a free-enterprise, private-property sys­tem, a corporate executive is an employee of the owners of the business. He has direct re­sponsibility to his employers. That responsi­bility is to conduct the business in accordance with their desires, which generally will be to make as much money as possible while con­forming to the basic rules of the society, both those embodied in law and those embodied in ethical custom. Of course, in some cases his employers may have a different objective. A group of persons might establish a corporation for an eleemosynary purpose–for exam­ple, a hospital or a school. The manager of such a corporation will not have money profit as his objective but the rendering of certain services.

In either case, the key point is that, in his capacity as a corporate executive, the manager is the agent of the individuals who own the corporation or establish the eleemosynary institution, and his primary responsibility is to them.

Needless to say, this does not mean that it is easy to judge how well he is performing his task. But at least the criterion of performance is straightforward, and the persons among whom a voluntary contractual arrangement exists are clearly defined.

Of course, the corporate executive is also a person in his own right. As a person, he may have many other responsibilities that he rec­ognizes or assumes voluntarily–to his family, his conscience, his feelings of charity, his church, his clubs, his city, his country. He ma}. feel impelled by these responsibilities to de­vote part of his income to causes he regards as worthy, to refuse to work for particular corpo­rations, even to leave his job, for example, to join his country's armed forces. Ifwe wish, we may refer to some of these responsibilities as "social responsibilities." But in these respects he is acting as a principal, not an agent; he is spending his own money or time or energy, not the money of his employers or the time or energy he has contracted to devote to their purposes. If these are "social responsibili­ties," they are the social responsibilities of in­dividuals, not of business.

What does it mean to say that the corpo­rate executive has a "social responsibility" in his capacity as businessman? If this statement is not pure rhetoric, it must mean that he is to act in some way that is not in the interest of his employers. For example, that he is to refrain from increasing the price of the product in order to contribute to the social objective of preventing inflation, even though a price in crease would be in the best interests of the corporation. Or that he is to make expendi­tures on reducing pollution beyond the amount that is in the best interests of the cor­poration or that is required by law in order to contribute to the social objective of improving the environment. Or that, at the expense of corporate profits, he is to hire "hardcore" un­employed instead of better qualified available workmen to contribute to the social objective of reducing poverty.

In each of these cases, the corporate exec­utive would be spending someone else's money for a general social interest. Insofar as his actions in accord with his "social responsi­bility" reduce returns to stockholders, he is spending their money. Insofar as his actions raise the price to customers, he is spending the customers' money. Insofar as his actions lower the wages of some employees, he is spending their money.

The stockholders or the customers or the employees could separately spend their own money on the particular action if they wished to do so. The executive is exercising a distinct "social responsibility," rather than serving as an agent of the stockholders or the customers or the employees, only if he spends the money in a different way than they would have spent it.

But if he does this, he is in effect imposing taxes, on the one hand, and deciding how the tax proceeds shall be spent, on the other.

This process raises political questions on two levels: principle and consequences. On the level of political principle, the imposition of taxes and the expenditure of tax proceeds are gov­ernmental functions. We have established elab­orate constitutional, parliamentary and judicial provisions to control these functions, to assure that taxes are imposed so far as possible in ac­cordance with the preferences and desires of the public–after all, "taxation without repre­sentation" was one of the battle cries of the American Revolution. We have a system of checks and balances to separate the legisla­tive function of imposing taxes and enacting expenditures from the executive function of collecting taxes and administering expendi­ture programs and from the judicial function of mediating disputes and interpreting the law.

Here the businessman–self-selected or appointed directly or indirectly by stockhold­ers–is to be simultaneously legislator, execu­tive and, jurist. He is to decide whom to tax by how much and for what purpose, and he is to spend the proceeds–all this guided only by general exhortations from on high to restrain inflation, improve the environment, fight poverty and so on and on.

The whole justification for permitting the corporate executive to be selected by the stockholders is that the executive is an agent serving the interests of his principal. This jus­tification disappears when the corporate ex­ecutive imposes taxes and spends the pro­ceeds for "social" purposes. He becomes in effect a public employee, a civil servant, even though he remains in name an employee of a private enterprise. On grounds of political principle, it is intolerable that such civil ser­vants–insofar as their actions in the name of social responsibility are real and not just win­dow-dressing–should be selected as they are now. If they are to be civil servants, then they must be elected through a political process. If they are to impose taxes and make expendi­tures to foster "social" objectives, then politi­cal machinery must be set up to make the as­sessment of taxes and to determine through a political process the objectives to be served.

This is the basic reason why the doctrine of "social responsibility" involves the acceptance of the socialist view that political mechanisms, not market mechanisms, are the appropriate way to determine the allocation of scarce re­sources to alternative uses.

On the grounds of consequences, can the corporate executive in fact discharge his al­leged "social responsibilities?" On the other hand, suppose he could get away with spending the stockholders' or customers' or employees' money. How is he to know how to spend it? He is told that he must contribute to fighting inflation. How is he to know what ac­tion of his will contribute to that end? He is presumably an expert in running his company–in producing a product or selling it or financing it. But nothing about his selection makes him an expert on inflation. Will his hold­ ing down the price of his product reduce infla­tionary pressure? Or, by leaving more spending power in the hands of his customers, simply divert it elsewhere? Or, by forcing him to produce less because of the lower price, will it simply contribute to shortages? Even if he could an­swer these questions, how much cost is he justi­fied in imposing on his stockholders, customers and employees for this social purpose? What is his appropriate share and what is the appropri­ate share of others?

And, whether he wants to or not, can he get away with spending his stockholders', cus­tomers' or employees' money? Will not the stockholders fire him? (Either the present ones or those who take over when his actions in the name of social responsibility have re­duced the corporation's profits and the price of its stock.) His customers and his employees can desert him for other producers and em­ployers less scrupulous in exercising their so­cial responsibilities.

This facet of "social responsibility" doc­ trine is brought into sharp relief when the doctrine is used to justify wage restraint by trade unions. The conflict of interest is naked and clear when union officials are asked to subordinate the interest of their members to some more general purpose. If the union offi­cials try to enforce wage restraint, the consequence is likely to be wildcat strikes, rank­-and-file revolts and the emergence of strong competitors for their jobs. We thus have the ironic phenomenon that union leaders–at least in the U.S.–have objected to Govern­ment interference with the market far more consistently and courageously than have business leaders.

The difficulty of exercising "social responsibility" illustrates, of course, the great virtue of private competitive enterprise–it forces people to be responsible for their own actions and makes it difficult for them to "exploit" other people for either selfish or unselfish purposes. They can do good–but only at their own expense.

Many a reader who has followed the argu­ment this far may be tempted to remonstrate that it is all well and good to speak of Government's having the responsibility to im­pose taxes and determine expenditures for such "social" purposes as controlling pollu­tion or training the hard-core unemployed, but that the problems are too urgent to wait on the slow course of political processes, that the exercise of social responsibility by busi­nessmen is a quicker and surer way to solve pressing current problems.

Aside from the question of fact–I share Adam Smith's skepticism about the benefits that can be expected from "those who affected to trade for the public good"–this argument must be rejected on grounds of principle. What it amounts to is an assertion that those who favor the taxes and expenditures in question have failed to persuade a majority of their fellow citizens to be of like mind and that they are seeking to attain by undemocratic procedures what they cannot attain by democratic proce­dures. In a free society, it is hard for "evil" people to do "evil," especially since one man's good is another's evil.

I have, for simplicity, concentrated on the special case of the corporate executive, ex­cept only for the brief digression on trade unions. But precisely the same argument ap­plies to the newer phenomenon of calling upon stockholders to require corporations to exercise social responsibility (the recent G.M crusade for example). In most of these cases, what is in effect involved is some stockholders trying to get other stockholders (or customers or employees) to contribute against their will to "social" causes favored by the activists. In­sofar as they succeed, they are again imposing taxes and spending the proceeds.

The situation of the individual proprietor is somewhat different. If he acts to reduce the returns of his enterprise in order to exercise his "social responsibility," he is spending his own money, not someone else's. If he wishes to spend his money on such purposes, that is his right, and I cannot see that there is any ob­jection to his doing so. In the process, he, too, may impose costs on employees and cus­tomers. However, because he is far less likely than a large corporation or union to have mo­nopolistic power, any such side effects will tend to be minor.

Of course, in practice the doctrine of social responsibility is frequently a cloak for actions that are justified on other grounds rather than a reason for those actions.

To illustrate, it may well be in the long run interest of a corporation that is a major employer in a small community to devote resources to providing amenities to that community or to improving its government. That may make it easier to attract desirable employees, it may reduce the wage bill or lessen losses from pilferage and sabotage or have other worthwhile effects. Or it may be that, given the laws about the deductibility of corporate charitable contributions, the stockholders can contribute more to chari­ties they favor by having the corporation make the gift than by doing it themselves, since they can in that way contribute an amount that would otherwise have been paid as corporate taxes.

In each of these–and many similar–cases, there is a strong temptation to rationalize these actions as an exercise of "social responsibility." In the present climate of opinion, with its wide spread aversion to "capitalism," "profits," the "soulless corporation" and so on, this is one way for a corporation to generate goodwill as a by-product of expenditures that are entirely justified in its own self-interest.

It would be inconsistent of me to call on corporate executives to refrain from this hyp­ocritical window-dressing because it harms the foundations of a free society. That would be to call on them to exercise a "social re­sponsibility"! If our institutions, and the atti­tudes of the public make it in their self-inter­est to cloak their actions in this way, I cannot summon much indignation to denounce them. At the same time, I can express admiration for those individual proprietors or owners of closely held corporations or stockholders of more broadly held corporations who disdain such tactics as approaching fraud.

Whether blameworthy or not, the use of the cloak of social responsibility, and the nonsense spoken in its name by influential and presti­gious businessmen, does clearly harm the foun­dations of a free society. I have been impressed time and again by the schizophrenic character of many businessmen. They are capable of being extremely farsighted and clearheaded in matters that are internal to their businesses. They are incredibly shortsighted and muddle­headed in matters that are outside their businesses but affect the possible survival of busi­ness in general. This shortsightedness is strikingly exemplified in the calls from many businessmen for wage and price guidelines or controls or income policies. There is nothing that could do more in a brief period to destroy a market system and replace it by a centrally con­trolled system than effective governmental con­trol of prices and wages.

The shortsightedness is also exemplified in speeches by businessmen on social respon­sibility. This may gain them kudos in the short run. But it helps to strengthen the already too prevalent view that the pursuit of profits is wicked and immoral and must be curbed and controlled by external forces. Once this view is adopted, the external forces that curb the market will not be the social consciences, however highly developed, of the pontificating executives; it will be the iron fist of Government bureaucrats. Here, as with price and wage controls, businessmen seem to me to reveal a suicidal impulse.

The political principle that underlies the market mechanism is unanimity. In an ideal free market resting on private property, no individual can coerce any other, all coopera­tion is voluntary, all parties to such coopera­tion benefit or they need not participate. There are no values, no "social" responsibilities in any sense other than the shared values and responsibilities of individuals. Society is a collection of individuals and of the various groups they voluntarily form.

The political principle that underlies the political mechanism is conformity. The indi­vidual must serve a more general social inter­est–whether that be determined by a church or a dictator or a majority. The individual may have a vote and say in what is to be done, but if he is overruled, he must conform. It is appropriate for some to require others to contribute to a general social purpose whether they wish to or not.

Unfortunately, unanimity is not always feasi­ble. There are some respects in which conformity appears unavoidable, so I do not see how one can avoid the use of the political mecha­nism altogether.

But the doctrine of "social responsibility" taken seriously would extend the scope of the political mechanism to every human activity. It does not differ in philosophy from the most explicitly collectivist doctrine. It differs only by professing to believe that collectivist ends can be attained without collectivist means. That is why, in my book Capitalism and Freedom, I have called it a "fundamentally subversive doctrine" in a free society, and have said that in such a society, "there is one and only one social responsibility of business–to use it resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud."

Jun 13, 2009

Trent's Moral Matrix

Moral Matrix

Conservative NeoLiberalism huh??

Conservative NeoLiberalism is a moderate form of Economic Conservatism.

Neoliberalism is a political philosophy and a political-economic movement beginning in the 1970s that de-emphasizes or rejects government intervention in the economy, focusing instead on achieving progress and even social justice by more free-market methods, especially an emphasis on economic growth, as measured by changes in real gross domestic product.




Moral Matrix

Trent's Political Matrix

Political Matrix

Looks about right to me.....

The Political Matrix

Jun 2, 2009

The Social Characteristics of Capitalism and the Psychological Causes of Its Vilification

Nonetheless, many people, and especially intellectuals, passionately loathe capitalism. As they see it, this ghastly mode of society’s economic organization has brought about nothing but mischief and misery. Men were once happy and prosperous in the good old days preceding the Industrial Revolution. Now under capitalism the immense majority are starving paupers ruthlessly exploited by rugged individualists. For these scoundrels nothing counts but their moneyed interests. They do not produce good and really useful things, but only what will yield the highest profits. They poison bodies with alcoholic beverages and tobacco, and souls and minds with tabloids, lascivious books and silly moving pictures. The “ideological superstructure” of capitalism is a literature of decay and degradation, the burlesque show and the art of striptease, the Hollywood pictures and the detective stories.




The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality

Wiki:The_Anti-Capitalistic_Mentality

May 24, 2009

Elle Pace (aka Laurie Justus Pace) Texas Premier Contemporary Artist

Just as Splintering light fractions into thousands of colors, Laurie's life has encompassed many careers, from runway model to graphic artist, from musician to singer, from teacher to artist. The greatest influence in her art is her faith and belief that her gift of creativity is from the Lord.


With a degree in art, doors opened to eight years as head artist with an advertising agency; twenty-five years of teaching art has come full circle to top honors yearly at international art shows in photography, watercolor and oils. Laurie is a member of The Daily Painters, The Five Graces, The American Watercolor Societiy, Profesisonal Published Fine Artists and is a listed artist on askart.com and artprice.com. In addition, she has exhibited with the dalls Committee of the Fine Arts in Dallas. She loves working with oils, intense colors, a palette knife and brushes, boldly capturing the energy of colors na dmotion on the canvas.


Today Laurie's work is collected internationally by both private collectors and corporations. her artwork has been published in numerous magazines, newspapers and blooks. currently she is represented by Earth Works Art Gallery of Penn Yan, New York; The Red Tree Gallery, Atascadero, California; The Rare Gallery in Jackson Hole, Wyoming; The Rian Bird Gallery of Blanco, Texas; The Gillia jones Gallery, Ohio; and the SR Gallery of Hong Kong.





These are still for sale

Contact me if interested

Elle Pace 1

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Elle Pace 2

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ORIGINAL Elle Pace Running Horses Painting COLORFUL!!!
THICK PILED ON BUTTERY OIL PAINTS ~ COLLECTED ARTIST




ORIGINAL Elle Pace Horse Head Painting Lotta Oil Globs!

Jan 24, 2009

Quick Rick



The Top 25 Rickey Henderson Quotes of All-Time...

1) Rickey... on referring to himself in the third person:

"Listen, people are always saying, 'Rickey says Rickey.' But it's been blown way out of proportion. People might catch me, when they know I'm ticked off, saying, 'Rickey, what the heck are you doing, Rickey?' They say, 'Darn, Rickey, what are you saying Rickey for? Why don't you just say, 'I?' But I never did. I always said, 'Rickey,' and it became something for people to joke about."

2) In the early 1980s, the Oakland A's accounting department was
freaking out. The books were off $1 million. After an investigation, it was determined Rickey was the reason why. The GM asked him about a $1 million bonus he had received and Rickey said instead of cashing it, he framed it and hung it on a wall at his house.

3) In 1996, Henderson's first season with San Diego, he boarded the team bus and was looking for a seat. Steve Finley said, "You have tenure, sit wherever you want." Henderson looked at Finley and said, "Ten years? Ricky's been playing at least 16, 17 years."

4) This one might be my second favorite. This wasn't too long ago, I think it was the year he ended up playing with the Red Sox. Anyway, he called San Diego GM Kevin Towers and left the following message: "This is Rickey calling on behalf of Rickey. Rickey wants to play baseball."

5) This one happened in Seattle. Rickey struck out and as the next
batter was walking past him, he heard Henderson say, "Don't worry,
Rickey, you're still the best."

6) Rickey once asked a teammate how long it would take him to drive to the Dominican Republic.

7) Moments after breaking Lou Brock's stolen base record, Henderson told the crowd - with Brock mere feet next to him - "Lou Brock was a great base stealer, but today, I am the greatest of all-time."

8) Henderson once fell asleep on an ice pack and got frostbite - which forced him to miss three games - in mid-August.

9) A reporter asked Henderson if Ken Caminiti's estimate that 50 percent of Major League players were taking steroids was accurate. His response was, "Well, Rickey's not one of them, so that's 49 percent right there."

10) Henderson broke Ty Cobb's career record for runs scored with a home run. After taking his usual 45 seconds or so around the bases, Rickey slid into home plate.

11) On being Nolan Ryan's 5,000th career strikeout: "It gave me no
chance. He (Ryan) just blew it by me. But it's an honor. I'll have
another paragraph in all the baseball books. I'm already in the books three or four times."

12) San Diego GM Kevin Towers was trying to contact Rickey at a nearby hotel. He knew Henderson always used fake names to avoid the press, fans, etc. He was trying to think like Rickey and after several attempts; he was able to get Henderson on the phone.
Rickey had checked in under Richard Pryor.

13) I didn't believe this one at first. However, I emailed a few
contacts within the Sox organization and they claim it actually
happened. This is priceless, it really is.

The morning after the Sox finished off the sweep against St. Louis last October, Henderson called someone in the organization looking for tickets to Game 6 at Fenway Park.

14) The Mets were staying in a hotel less than a mile from Cinergy Field in Cincinnati. While some players walked, most took the team bus. A few minutes after they arrived - again it was less than a mile - the last players off the bus noticed a stretched limo that had just pulled up.

Of course, Rickey emerged from the back seat.

15) A reporter once asked Rickey if he talked to himself, "Do I talk to myself? No, I just remind myself of what I'm trying to do. You know, I never answer myself so how can I be talking to myself?"

16) a few weeks into Henderson's stint with the
Mariners, he walked up to Olerud at the batting cage and asked him why he wore a batting helmet in the field. Olerud explained that he had an aneurysm at nine years old and he wore the helmet for protection. Legend goes that Henderson said, "Yeah, I used to play with a guy that had thesame thing."

Legend also goes that Olerud said, "That was me, Rickey."

Henderson played with Olerud on the Blue Jays and the Mets.

17) Rickey was asked if he had the Garth Brooks album with Friends in Low Places and Henderson said, "Rickey doesn't have albums. Rickey has CDs."

18) During a contract holdout with Oakland in the early 1990s, Henderson said, "If they want to pay me like Mike Gallego, I'll play like Gallego."

19) In the late 1980s, the Yankees sent Henderson a six-figure bonus check. After a few months passed, an internal audit revealed the check had not been cashed. Current Yankees GM Brian Cashman - then a low-level nobody with the organization - called Rickey and asked if there was a problem with the check. Henderson said, "I'm just waiting for the money market rates to go up."

20) In June 1999, when Henderson was playing with the Mets, he saw
reporters running around the clubhouse before a game. He asked a
teammate what was going on and he was told that Tom Robson, the team's hitting coach, had just been fired. Henderson said, "Who's he?"

21) This is my all-time favorite. Rickey was pulled over by a San Diego police officer for speeding. As the officer was approaching Rickey's car, the window went down a few inches and a folded $100 bill emerged. The officer let Rickey and his money head home without a ticket.

22) When he was on the Yankees in the mid-1980s, Henderson told
teammates that his condo had such a great view that he could see, "The Entire State Building."

23) During one of his stays with Oakland, Henderson's locker was next to Billy Beane's. After making the team out of spring training, Beane was sent to the minors after a few months. Upon his return, about six weeks later, Henderson looked at Beane and said, "Hey, man, where have you been? Haven't seen you in awhile."

24) To this day and dating back 25 years, before every game he plays, Henderson stands completely naked in front of a full length locker room mirror and says, "Ricky's the best," for several minutes.

25) In the last week of his lone season with the Red Sox, Chairman Tom Werner asked Henderson what he would like for his 'going-away' gift.
Henderson said he wasn't going anywhere, but he would like owner John
Henry's Mercedes. Werner said it would be tough to get the same make and
model in less than a week and Henderson said, "No, I want his car."
Turns out the Sox got Henderson a Red Thunderbird and when he saw it on
the field before the last game of the season, Rickey said, "Whose ugly
car is on the field?"
In honor of Rickey claiming he is going for yet another comeback this year here are Rickey's top 25 quotes that Rickey ever said.

Jan 8, 2009

Chop Chop!!!




Chop-chop

Meaning:

Be quick; hurry up.

Origin:

This little reduplicated term has its origins in the South China Sea, as a Pidgin English version of the Chinese term k'wâi-k'wâi. The earliest known citation of chop-chop in print is from the English language newspaper that was printed in Canton in the early 19th century - The Canton Register, 13th May 1834:

We have also... 'chop-chop hurry'.

A slightly fuller account was printed two years later, in a monthly journal which was produced by and for American missionaries in Canton - The Chinese Repository. In January 1836 it contained an article headed 'Jargon Spoken in Canton', which included:

"Chop-chop - pidgin Cantonese phrase for 'Hurry up!'"