Why does Fido shake?

The Wet Dog Shake: Scientists (apparently don't) Uncover Secret Formula - ABC News: "
An important physical factor not mentioned in the article: wet fur physically is "loosely coupled" to the interior of the dog. The "wet fur shake" is similar to a flywheel driven by a spring, and made to oscillate rotationally. The rotational intertia of the fur and the nature of its coupling to the dog's musculature result in a resonant system which oscillates easily at one frequency and with greater difficulty at different frequencies. Increasing the radius of the flywheel tends to increase its rotational intertia and reduce the resonant frequency of the system.

Why does Fido shake himself dry at a particular rotational frequency? Because he can get enough rotational velocity to disperse the water only if he shakes near the system's resonant frequency. In other words: why does he shake at that frequency? Because he can. Why doesn't he shake at a different frequency? Because it's hard, and it doesn't do anything for him. Good dog.

Clarendon Hills Middle School wind turbine blows $51,000

Middle school starts up new wind turbine — Hinsdale news, photos and events — TribLocal.com: "

Sanity check: $51,000 for a wind turbine that produces $582 per year will recover its initial cost in 87 years, if we naively assume it can be maintained at zero cost. Even if we assume steep growth in the cost of electricity (7% per year) and zero maintenance, the break-even point still is at least several decades, much longer than the equipment will actually survive. Economically this project is unjustifiable, and amounts to $51,000 that no longer can be spent usefully inside the school building on teachers, books, lab equipment, or computers.

Who are the wind turbine's biggest beneficiaries? Follow the money.

Middle school wind turbine benefits equipment makers, not students

Turbine whips up interest - Triblocal - Voice of the town

Dear Editor,

The new, $24,000 wind turbine at Thomas Middle School poses some thorny questions: What is its economic value, and what is its educational value?

With a peak rated output of 2.4 kilowatts, this wind turbine can generate 57 kWh (kilowatt-hours) per day if there is constant wind. But wind isn't constant, and wind turbines typically operate at about 30% peak capacity.[1] This offers the school electricity worth about $1.38 per day at today's electric rates. Let's figure out when the turbine will "pay for itself". We start with several assumptions biased in favor of the wind turbine:

1. The equipment never requires repair or maintenance -such an assumption wouldn't be optimistic so much as foolish.
2. The total upfront cost of the installation is $24,000, or $10,000 per kW. Yes, $10,000 of this came through a State of Illinois grant, but we taxpayers still foot the entire cost. And let’s assume that if this sum were invested elsewhere, it could earn about 3% annually.
3. All the generated power is used productively by the school or returned to the grid. (Whether this is the case, the Trib article doesn't reveal.)
4. The cost of electricity today is about 8 cents per kWh. Let's assume it will increase steeply at 7% every year.

"Honey... did we buy the extended warranty?"

Given these assumptions, our wind turbine will “break even” in the year 2044, when today's 7th graders are 46 years old: that is, after 34 years operation without repair or maintenance, and only after a hypothetical tenfold increase in electric rates. Using more realistic assumptions, there's no reasonable hope that this project ever will recover its cost to taxpayers.

How will the wind turbine benefit our students educationally? Will they learn how wind turbines generate electricity? Great! But this can be taught in the classroom, and in hands-on labs with much less expensive equipment.

Will the wind turbine be used to teach students how to think critically, how to estimate the costs and benefits of such a project? Will they learn that some projects advertised as "green" actually waste more resources than they conserve: that sometimes "green" is only skin deep?

True conservation, true "green renewal", requires good use of our resources, and minimizing economic waste is part of the environmental equation. Our science students need to learn this, and we can teach the concept, but wasting money on unneeded equipment teaches a perverse lesson: that waste is good. In fact, we can teach science much better without our own turbine, because the funds wasted on this equipment could be better used to augment faculty, books, and labs... or to supplement next year's budget.

The solar panels installed at the school three years ago failed to generate much interest. Their economic benefit also has been uninspiring: a total generated output of 1252 kWh[2], worth only $100. Dare we ask what the solar panels cost to purchase and install? Have they proved to be a good investment either educationally or economically? Who profited most from the solar panels: the students, or those who sold the system? What other educational opportunities were lost when the solar panels were funded? What reason is there to believe the wind turbine will provide any greater benefit than the solar panels? How long will the wind turbine capture attention before there are proposals to buy the next New Thing?

Education dollars are precious and we can't afford to squander them. For the sake of our children we need to urge our schools to sharpen their priorities and make the best possible use of the available funds. We shouldn’t tolerate wasteful spending at the expense of our children.

________________________________________

[1] American Wind Energy Association: http://www.awea.org/faq/wwt_basics.html.
[2] As of 9/13/2010. Arlington Heights School District 25: http://www.ahsd25.k12.il.us/schools/thomas/science/solarPanel.php, http://view2.fatspaniel.net/PV2Web/merge?view=PV/detailDC/HostedAdmin&eid=88637.

CBS2 News can find no Obama critics in Chicago

As Economy Struggles, Confidence In Obama Wanes - Jay Levine, cbs2chicago.com:

You wrote, "[People] understand President Obama didn't create the crisis; he inherited it..." Nothing like unbiased journalism!

This article acknowledges the Chicago public's decreasing confidence in our president's policies, but seems desperate to conceal just how pervasive and deep is the discontent. You claim he enjoys a 51 percent approval rating in Chicago, yet quote only Obama supporters and reluctant critics, and say, "it's hard to get people here to criticize him". That's ridiculous! With only 51% approval in the Chicago area there are no critics to be found? You’d be more truthful to write, "it's hard to get the media here to criticize him." Your article is a case in point.

This article isn’t serious journalism. It's apologetic fluff, the sort of softball propaganda that merits little but ridicule, and a search elsewhere for some real news coverage.

Christopher Hitchens: I'm sorry that I probably won't live to see the death of 'elderly criminal' Benedict XVI

Christopher Hitchens: I'm sorry that I probably won't live to see the death of 'elderly criminal' Benedict XVI

The bitter figs that fall from Mr. Hitchens' branches may be a sign that the harvest is near. I pray that this tree bears more happy fruit before it's too late.

Ahmadinejad's favorite hits

"Ring of Fire", from Ahmadinejad's favorite hits

Verse 1:
War -it's a lovely thing,
and it makes a fiery ring.
I can start one, watch me try.
Then, watch my enemies cry.

Refrain:
I will set the mid-East on fire.
My enemies will burn while I climb higher.
And Iran will rule from amidst the pyre,
Amidst the pyre.

Verse 2:
The race for nukes is sweet
With centrifuges beneath my feet.
Lots of uranium I've refined
For the holy war I have in mind.

Verse 3:
The Zionists will soon be gone,
Just as I've promised all along.
America will not defend,
and both will come to a fiery end.

Final Refrain:
I will set the whole world on fire.
The mushroom clouds will go high, high, higher.
And soon you'll know I ain't no liar,
I ain't no liar.

(-thanks to Johnny Cash)

Kim Jong-il ...a saber-rattlin' man

Refrain:
I was born a saber-rattlin' man.
Tryin' to be a tyrant and doin' the best I can.
When it comes to diplomacy I hope you'll understand
I was born a saber-rattlin' man.

Verse 1:
My daddy was a commie down in Chŏnju.
He traded in his Bible for a gun.
And I was born in the backseat of a Pyongyang bus
rollin' down Highway Mao Tse-Tung.

Verse 2:
I've purged the country of my adversaries,
all troublemakers and their friends and sons.
My only enemy is every country in the world,
my hobby is provokin' them for fun.

Verse 3:
I've rockets I can launch when I get angry,
I've nukes in case they make me really mad.
My people might be starvin' but they love me.
I'm sure they'd let me know if times were bad.

Verse 4:
My Taepodongs have better range than ever.
I aimed one over Japan and let it fly.
Their knees down south were knocking when they saw it overhead,
I laughed so hard I swear it made me cry!

Verse 5:
I'm itchin' for a war, there's no mistakin',
Four million hungry troops at my command.
The imperialists have lots to lose, I'm thinkin',
and bad boys always get what they demand.

Ramblin' Man, Allman Brothers Band

How Mayor Daley's administration contributes to the killing

Latest police slaying under investigation - chicagotribune.com

God bless and comfort the families of these murdered, heroic officers.

Mayor Daley, however, should be called to account for how his administration and policies have contributed to Chicago's ongoing orgy of murder.

• Many areas of the city need more police protection, protection the city can not financially afford. Yet millions of dollars are wasted by this corrupt political machine, dollars that are badly needed for additional police and other vital services.
  
  
• Mayor Daley has armed police guards to protect him, and even the police are not safe from murderers. Most citizens don't have such protection. Yet the mayor has been a constant enemy of the constitutional right of citizens to own handguns to protect their families and homes.
  
  
• The mayor's support for elective abortion, and his big government, tax-more spend-more policies have cultivated an anti-life atmosphere corrosive to families, hostile to hope, and conducive to violent crime.

Abortion protest set at Aurora clinic following free speech victory

Abortion protest set at Aurora clinic following settlement - Chicago Tribune

It's OK to kill babies inside the Planned Parenthood chop shop, but for some reason the company doesn't like demonstrators displaying pictures of what actually happens to the babies.

Blood, guts, and the truth... can't be good for business.

Busting out the economy -since 1934

 

1934 Cartoon from Chicago Tribune

"What's past is prologue." -William Shakespeare

Mother and baby dead: abortion clinic says everything went "well"

Queens clinic A1 Medicine probed after Alexandra Nunez is fatally injured while undergoing abortion

Detectives are investigating a Queens clinic where a 37-year-old woman was fatally injured while undergoing an abortion, officials said Tuesday.

Alexandra Nuñez began bleeding heavily during the procedure at A1 Medicine in Jackson Heights on Monday, officials said.

One of Nuñez's arteries was inadvertently severed and she went into cardiac arrest, according to police sources.

She was taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center, where she died a short time later.
...
An employee at the clinic - a one-stop gynecology and plastic surgery clinic that was still seeing patients yesterday - insisted that everything had gone well at the second-floor medical facility.

"The patient was transferred to the hospital, she didn't die at the clinic," said the woman, who refused to give her name. "Nothing happened here."

And what is the clinic's concern after evidently causing the death of a patient? ...that they're not to blame. "Nothing happened here."

ABC happy to insult Jesus and His followers

All Hail? Apple Expected to Unveil 'Jesus' Tablet Today - ABC News

All Hail? Apple Expected to Unveil 'Jesus' Tablet Today
...Though Apple has been characteristically quiet on details, industry watchers say all signs seem to point to the announcement of a device so hyped it has been dubbed the "Jesus" tablet...

The casual use of the name of Jesus is scandalous to many Christians, who love Jesus and worship Him as God.

It's one thing to acknowledge within the article that some have referred to the new Apple device as the "Jesus tablet". But to make that the focus of the article's title is unnecessary and truly in bad taste.

ABC is displaying a crass insensitivity toward the religious sensibilities of many individuals. Would ABC insult Islam in this way?

Wael Farouk -the art of doing one thing well

Egyptian Piano Phenomenon Studies at Converse College -Connections Online Magazine (October 2007 issue)

Converse graduate student and pianist Wael Farouk was turned away from the Cairo Conservatory of Music when he was seven years old.

It wasn't because of his grades; they were exceptional. It wasn't because of his age; young students are not unusual. The reason? His small hands. But Wael and his father managed to convince the administration to just give him a chance. They did, and Wael began what would become a 15-year tenure of studying at the conservatory with consistent high marks.
"Ever since I was a boy, I have had to prove that I can play piano no matter what people say," said the 23-year-old. "People do different things well, and piano is the only thing I do well -even with my small hands. I do it through faith, will, and my trust in God."

Wael became the first Egyptian to ever play the Rachmaninoff's Third Concerto, and debuted the piece with the Cairo Symphony Orchestra in 2002. "That moment was the highest and happiest in my life," said Wael. This piece is extremely demanding for any pianist, and it has the longest stretch at the keyboard ever recorded. Wael debuted the piece in Russia in 2003, and he was invited back to play it again this March...

I had never seen Wael Farouk before his recital at Steinway Pianos in Downers Grove, Illinois, on April 18, 2009. When he took the stage, I couldn't help but notice his very small stature and similarly small hands. I confess I felt a little disappointed, my expectations diminished, for the Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, and Rachmaninoff on his program -as well as the Steinway Model D- promised to demand more power than Mr. Farouk could possibly be expected to deliver.

Never will I forget my astonishment, which remains vivid today, ten months later. Mr. Farouk's performance of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition was bold, exciting, full of color and power.

The Rachmaninoff Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor, Op. 36, was unfamiliar and new to me. But Mr. Farouk did not simply play the piece so much as conjure a hurricane, an impassioned and unstoppable force that burst from the piano and unleashed its fury on all present.

I couldn't have been more wrong when I expected a pint-size performance from this physically small man. I thought I knew better than to judge a book by its cover, yet I misjudged this artist before hearing him. Wael Farouk helped me to see more clearly that making the piano speak to the heart depends much more on the heart than on the hands.

Wael Farouk delivers Chopin

Chopin Preludes, Opus 28


Op 28, No. 3,4


Op 28, No. 13


Op 28, No. 14


Op 28, No. 15, "Raindrop"


Op 28, No. 24

Wael Farouk brings Pictures at an Exhibition to life

Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition

Wael Farouk in Las Palmas, Spain (date?)

Mr. Farouk delivers a blazing and colorful performance!

Wael Farouk -a Category 5 storm at the Steinway

Wael Farouk's Rachmaninoff Sonata No. 2 begins with a caress, then erupts with breathtaking ferocity and passion. Mr. Farouk clearly is much larger on the inside than his appearance suggests. 

How does he do it? And why isn't he better known?

Solomon Mikowsky, student Wael Farouk, and conductor Philippe Entremont following a performance of the Rachmaninoff Concerto #3 at Manhattan School of Music, 2008. (*)

Got Hope? The change will cost us another $1.9 trillion

Democrats propose $1.9T increase in debt limit -Yahoo! News

"WASHINGTON - Senate Democrats on Wednesday proposed allowing the federal government to borrow an additional $1.9 trillion to pay its bills, a record increase that would permit the national debt to reach $14.3 trillion.

The unpopular legislation is needed to allow the federal government to issue bonds to fund programs and prevent a first-time default on obligations. It promises to be a challenging debate for Democrats, who, as the party in power, hold the responsibility for passing the legislation."

The Democrats' insatiable appetite for spending exceeds even the Republicans of the previous administration, who became intoxicated with the vision of a federal government as a limitless source of cash and solution to every problem.

But the Republicans apparently were Small Potatoes compared with the current Democrat administration, whose desire to control and consume All Things reminds me of a python preparing to swallow a goat.

Republican gives "Kennedy's seat" back to the people... White House yawns

White House: Mass. Vote Won't Change Anything -Newsmax

"One reporter suggested the political blowback in Massachusetts might indicate the administration was out of step with the American people.

[White House Press Secretary Robert] Gibbs replied: 'I think, according to any reasonable measure, the answer to that is, of course not.'"

While many democrats begin to abandon the burning ship of the Obama agenda in order to save their own skin, a few will remain defiant to the end, determined to carry on their course against a rising sea of popular opposition. Public opinion, outcry, and outrage will not deter the diehard radicals. No matter the cost, they will blindly pursue the most radical -and increasingly hated- elements of the Obama agenda, even if it brings about catastrophic losses for the Democratic Party.

For the radicals, it's not about the public good, and it's not even about their own party. It's about power, personal political power, the power to tear down and rebuild according to their own statist vision. To hell with democracy: they're in charge.