Connections

And the minor things you remember can make or break an argument.
Not that I believe the Global warming alarmists, but...

I was reading this Excerpt over at Bullwinkle's blog about the increase in hurricanes-where they'd never been!!!!!!

Recently, however, they have been forming in unusual places, which Gaertner sees as a clear danger signal.

In 2004, Hurricane Catarina formed in the south Atlantic and hit land in southern Brazil. A year later, Hurricane Vince formed next to the Madeira Islands and became the first to make landfall in Spain.

Ok, I've always admired the Brits (except when in school, learning about the Revolution), and know about Admiral Nelson and the Battle of Trafalgar.
...Where the majority of the damage and loss of life came from a hurricane just after the battle.

Off the coast of Cadiz.
In the S.E coast of Spain.
I know EXACTLY where it is because I was stationed about 20 miles north in Rota for two years. (ahhh, the memories....)

Anyway here's an excerpt from Amy Ridenour's blog.

Does anyone still care about the battle of Trafalgar? The empire which it secured 200 years ago, is long gone. The triumphal sense of British destiny, which sustained the Victorians and fed on the mythic image of Nelson dying on his flagship in the hour of victory, has vanished...
~snip~
Risking death in battle, defeating the French, and then keeping the fleet together in the terrible storm afterwards - a hurricane which, we now know, probably killed almost more sailors than the battle itself. How did they do it?

The hurricane is in the Official history of the British Navy, And probably the French and Spanish, too.




Ok, now that that's been proved wrong, I'd like to pat every one of you who are reading this in English. No matter which accent you're reading it in; if you have been or are involved with someone who has been the result of the Anglosphere's emphasis on training.

Nelson's contemporary, the military theorist Karl von Clausewitz, put his finger on it. He said there are two kinds of courage in battle. One depends on an emotional impulse triggered by patriotism or religious fanaticism or ideological fervour. It's the kind that drove the armies of the French and Russian Revolutions, and the Japanese and Germans in the Second World War. We see it every day in Iraq's insurgents, or the suicide bombers on a Spanish train or London tube.

The other kind of courage rests on a calm deliberate training of mind and body, until courage becomes a habit not just "in the face of physical danger, but in the face of responsibility."

The first type of courage looks impressive; but the second, Clausewitz says, "is more certain, because it has become a second nature" to those who have it, both on the battlefield and off.

That is the kind of courage the British sailors at Trafalgar had. It's the kind American and British sailors and soldiers showed on D-Day and in Burma in the Second World War, and show every day in Iraq in regiments such as the Black Watch. They were and are not driven by fanaticism or hate or an arrogant warrior's code. They just know they have to stay with the job with all its ugliness and horrors, until they reach the victorious end.

Good job guys!