On Cowardace

President Junior and other politicians have called last Tuesday's terrorist attacks cowardly.
Bill Maher has recently been criticized for calling America's use of cruise missles from a safe distance cowardly. He has since explained that he meant American politicians were cowardly because of that, not the military. (Because it's always okay to make fun of politicians.)
Some clarifications are in order here, people.

Suicidal terrorism isn't cowardly. The people who planned and funded the attacks and refuse to take credit for them are the cowardly ones.
If you show me a man who is willing and eager to fly a plane directly into a building, knowing it will kill him but wanting to do it to support whatever beliefs, organizations, or causes he holds dear, I am not going to call that man a coward.
If you show me a man who has flown a plane directly into a building to support whatever beliefs, organizations, or causes he held dear, I will definitely call that man a coward, as well as fairy, a nimbus, and a mincing little momma's boy. Because that man is dead, so I no longer have to worry about the insane bastard and his idiocy.

The opposite of cowardice is bravery. About the BRAVEST thing the American military could do in a war, or war-like "police action" situation, would be to charge into battle wearing pink tu-tu's and blindfolds, wielding ostrich feathers as their only weapons. It would also be god-damned retarded.
I can live with accusations that our country, or our military, is not brave. Other countries who make such accusations may not be able to live with them, however, because we may just decide to bomb the shit out of them.

Remember, dying for your country is very brave and very noble.
Making the other guys die for their countries is a much better way to win wars.

In closing, using the best weapons available to you to minimize casualties on your side may or may not be cowardly, but it's definitely sensible. I've knocked bravery a bit here, but real bravery happens when your best chance at accomplishing the goal entails a great deal of personal risk, but you do it anyway. I would like to commend all the firemen and rescue workers who were trying to help people out of the World Trade Center when the towers collapsed. I think they knew the risks they were taking, but were not about to stand by in relative safety when they had a chance to save other people's lives.