lordjedi said:
HAHAHAHA! Yeah, because Kirk isn't at all the "shoot first, ask questions later" type. That's exactly who Kirk is. That's what made him such a great starship captain. Diplomacy was out the door almost instantly with Kirk. There's nothing new here.

Hmm, I have seen all the episodes and all the movies, though not for quite a while, but I would have never considered Kirk a shoot first, act later kind of guy. He is usually quite cautious and thoughtful before acting, but more than willing to raise hell in order to protect those under his command.

In ST 3, his best friend had died, and he saw hope that Genesis would bring him back, so he hijacked the Enterprise, disobeying a direct order. I'd say disobeying direct orders wasn't something Kirk did a whole lot of, and definitely not just for the hell of it to feed his rebelous nature. Picard is probably more of a rebel, both First Contact and Insurrection have him disobeying orders big time.