On Tue, 16 Dec 2003 14:37:46 GMT, Kevin Brooks wrote:

"phil hunt" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 16 Dec 2003 04:07:33 GMT, Kevin Brooks
wrote:

"phil hunt" wrote in message
...
Saddam was an assassin in his youth, which presumably took osme
courage. What's the bravest thing Rumsfeld has personally done?

He flew jets onto and off of carriers at one time

Anywhere near a war zone?

IIRC his service was just after the Korean Conflict. That said, it takes
a
decent pair to land a high performance aircraft on a pitching and rolling
deck IMO.


--have you done that?

Nope. The only thing I've ever flown is a glider.

So you are somewhere beneath Rumsfeld then on this mythical
totem-pole-of-courage?

I've no idea whether I am or not. I've never claimed to be
courageous, BTW, and in any case it is irrelevant to the quewstion
of whether Saddam or Rumsfeld is more courageous.

I just find it comical when folks start besmirching someone else's courage,

I haven't besmirched *anyone's* courage, merely asked about it.

when their own demonstrations have not exhibited anything superlative to the
individual they are commenting about.

Thgat's like saying only tall people have a right to comment on the
height of others.

Well, then, you'll have to define bravery.

I was using it to mean deliberately taking an action that knowingly
places oneself at a risk of death or serious injury.

By that criterion, I guess I'm not a particularly brave person; for
example, I've never done anything that I thought was reasonably
likely to kill me.

How brave are you, by that criterion?

I always hate this kind of dick-measuring

It's not dick-measuring; look, some people might have a big ego
thing about others considering them courageous, but I don't. It's
just another property about people that some have more than others.

--it is a tool of the misinformed
and the Walter Mitty crowd. If you really care to know, I had exactly one
situation where I was scared ****less (almost literally) but managed to
handle it while safeguarding a young E-5 who was with me at the time.
Suffice it to say that it involved an old M151 jeep sans rollover
protection, a dirt road which was axle deep in mud, a very steep dropoff
into the valley below, the failure of said roadway edge, and telling said
E-5 to get out of the jeep even though we both thought that the act may
result in it going over the edge. I don't consider it particularly brave
(there was not much to be gained by both of us going over that roadside),
but it did go some way towards meeting the best criteria I have ever
personally heard describing that quality--my old college boxing instructor
once told us that bravery was doing what had to be done in spite of your own
natural fears. Using that definition, I don't think your assassins make the
grade--unless you think those women sitting at busstops or loading their
packages in the car just HAD to be shot by those miscreants I described
earlier. Now, are you about done with the dick-measuring?

Brooks




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