But that all said-maybe we should halt this discussion for OP's sake, and the answer to his question is "No, it's not a short circuit, since for the DC case in the pic, the capacitor charges up until the charge on the plates balances the applied voltage after which nothing moves. A cap is open circuit to DC."
(But I'd like to know if my thinking's flawed and maybe I'll open a thread on that.)
Edit: started this thread to discuss the varying DC stuff.