I especially like bravado: a swaggering show of courage (wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn) because this distinction reveals the corrupt motivation of the bravadoic: "swaggery"

"Swag" is Australian, I believe, for a theft. "Swaggery" might not have any currency yet, but its meaning is pretty clear from the foregoing

Do we have a way of making a corrupt display of courage? I do not believe so. Why would that be? My explanation derives from consideration of the assumption that "courage" comes from the French "courage" which I believe might be "coeur" (heart) plus "age" (age). Thus having heart that is aged suggests one is capable of accomplishing, by example and inspiration or in extreme solitude, quite a different (and more noble, i.e. evolutionarily advanced) outcome than if one has learned one's pretence to it, bravado, at a New England prep school, Harvard, frat parties, and Flight School.

As to the difference between courage and bravery, I think that courage manifests in a wider range of activities than does bravery. Thus Churchill, Gandhi, Mandela, and Roosevelt all displayed courage in a staggering array of circumstances. The brave do so only in a limited array of rather obvious forms of fortitude -- not that such feats are any the less spiritually awesome.

So the alternative to an alpha male is not timid, but rather displays genuine and astounding courage rather than the bravado of landing on a US aircraft carrier announcing success in Iraq after only approximately 2/60ths of the long grind so far. How pathetic! And if anyone does not now see this, please, please read a biography of either Mandela or Gandhi or Florence Nightingale or some of the suffragettes.

Spread the word. Bravado in English-speaking politics is rapidly going out, because TTers can now spot such a fraud from 90 paces and before the average fame-besotted journalist. It seems, however, to be appearing on the demeanours of Chinese apologists for the Han's behaviour in Tibet.