[TheTrekkie]

Originally Posted by Chris Fawkes

If Picard were educated i think he would understand why it would be better getting advice from professional counsel than the girl at the bar.

The girl at the bar was his friend. Of course he listens to his friends. And Guian is quite a old (age) friend with a lot of experience. There is a difference between experience and knowledge.
However Troi was one of Picard's most important advisors. I think only to Troi he really opened.

I admit that the Picard in Nemesis was not the same Picard that we all know and love (albeit less than we love Kirk).

In nemesis they wanted to make Picard to a bad Kirk copy. Stupid Baird!

I didn't know the transporter wasn't working, i must have been asleep by that part of the film.

I think Geordie said so. Picard just could come back with this new invented emergency transporter Data brought to the Scimitar.

How is this then. Picard knew full well that if captured by the borge and assimilated you could still be brought back. Yet when one of his crew gets taken by the borg in First Contact he shoots the poor guy, dead.

Maybe the first moment Picard allowed his hate to overwhelm his reason.
Almost like the beginning of "Hugh". But the big difference between Picard and every other Captain, in "Hugh" and in FC he recognized at the end what was right, was able to say he was wrong and changed his mind (he didn't use Hugh as weapon, he tried to rescue Data to show that no crewman is lost)
At the beginning I think Picard rather thought he rescued him from the borg, I think he saw it as a kind of medicide. Picard got a huge trauma, the chance of rescuing him was litte, so he saved him from getting a puppet of the collective's will.

[Chris Fawkes]

Good points.