Leverage

In the world according to Thomas Kinkade, life is simple, picturesque. Cozy cottages always glow with inviting light, flowers of all varieties always bloom in improbable synchronicity, the sun always breaks through storm clouds, promising hope and happiness and har-mony. Always.In Kinkadia, as in the incredibly popular paintings he produces, there are no angry slashes of emotion, no moral ambiguities, no overly cluttered lives. Always, though, there is a confounding of fantasy and realism, of light and darkness, a sense of childlike confidence in mankind and nature.

One of the first things Ted Marchibroda did yesterday was call Jerry Seeman, the NFL's director of officiating.The Ravens coach wanted an explanation of the two "leverage" calls that wiped out a pair of San Diego field goals Sunday and kept alive their deciding touchdown drive in a 14-13 victory."

SAN DIEGO -- A week ago, Ravens right defensive end Michael McCrary was the toast of the locker room. His four sacks had punctuated a victory for the win-starved Ravens. His performance yielded an AFC Defensive Player of the Week award.Yesterday, McCrary lived life on the other side of football's line.First of all, San Diego veteran left offensive tackle John Jackson -- with double-teaming help from such teammates as tight end Freddie Jones and H-back Wendell Davis -- denied McCrary his favorite meal.

Jermaine Lewis leads the Ravens by far with eight touchdowns in 1998, and the NFL's director of officiating admitted that Lewis should have been credited with his ninth score at a pivotal moment in Sunday's 14-13 loss to the San Diego Chargers.Ravens coach Ted Marchibroda said Jerry Seeman, the league's director of officiating, informed him yesterday that Lewis was not tripped by San Diego punter Darren Bennett during a 90-yard punt return for a touchdown with six minutes left in Sunday's game.

1 The Ravens, with the exception of punt returner Jermaine Lewis, got very little out of their special teams.2 The Ravens had 161 yards of total offense, including only 40 rushing, and failed to control the time of possession.3 The Ravens were flagged for 14 penalties, including two key "leverage" calls that set up the Chargers' winning touchdown, for 106 yards.Pub Date: 11/16/98

IF "merger" is the nineties' buzzword among big-name companies, "strategic alliance" is the term gaining strength among smaller ones.Such alliances are often informal agreements among companies exchange anything from personnel to services to customer lists.And financial advisers are finding themselves more responsible for helping clients hook up, as they attempt to achieve long-term goals at the low costs attractive in a decade of downsizing.What makes these alliances so attractive? How do they work?

Orioles farm director Syd Thrift made a good point the other day when discussing the ways in which the club is operating without a general manager.Asked about how the Orioles are pursuing free agents, such as Roberto Alomar and Ron Gant, without a point man, Thrift mentioned the integral role that players have in wooing other players."

The Brief Temptation of Bill Bidwill was strike one.The Great Expansion Fix was strike two.The Bucs Stop There was strike three.But we're not out.We'll never be out in our bid for an NFL franchise as long as the state-supported funding mechanism for a new football stadium at Camden Yards continues to exist.There'll always be franchises that are dissatisfied or for sale, and we'll always be a viable contender for their favor, a legitimate alternative, as long as we can offer a new stadium.

Charles Anthony could have been in Seattle yesterday, learning a new defense.Then again, he could have been in Cleveland, scoping out the Dawg Pound. Or Atlanta, inspecting the Georgia Dome.Instead, he was at Towson State for introductions and reacquaintances.The last of the Canadian Football League free agents to sign with the CFL Colts, Anthony participated in workouts for the first time with nine other arriving veterans.Anthony was in Baltimore, he said, because none of the NFL teams he talked to would give him enough money or could assure him that he would be around come September.

WASHINGTON -- President Clinton dropped a 19-year trade embargo against Vietnam yesterday in a major step toward reconciliation with the United States' old Cold War nemesis.The action, sought by U.S. companies eager for trade and investment ties with the poor but resource-rich Southeast Asian nation, moved the United States closer to normal relations with Vietnam. Already, banks, law firms, cigarette companies and other businesses have obtained licenses to open offices in Vietnam. Now, each nation will set up a liaison office in the other.

Try as they might, Maryland prison officials can't keep inmates from their addictions. That's keenly apparent from the drugs and paraphernalia found among the home-made weapons, cell phones and other contraband recovered in prison shakedowns. Corrections officials estimate that 80 percent of the state's 23,000 inmates have a drug problem. But the state can treat only about 3,300 inmates. That imbalance can't be overcome soon. At the same time, untreated addictions keep prisoners at high risk of reoffending upon release.

Once again, it appears the Orioles have overplayed their hand in seeking a spring training site, assuming they had enough leverage to squeeze whatever they wanted out of one of the cities that recently lost its major league tenant. They might be able to go back to Vero Beach next month and resume negotiations, but it appears they might be doomed to a lesser deal than they could have gotten if they had been more decisive. ( For more, go to baltimoresun.com/schmuckblog)

Corporations have all the power, all the money, Nathan Ford (Timothy Hutton) tells a weeping mother at the end of the pilot for a series premiering Sunday night on TNT. "We provide [pause] leverage." So begins Leverage, a Mission Impossible-type series of a band of merry pranksters - hackers, grifters, escape artists and thieves - assembled to right the wrongs of society with high-tech tools. There is nothing new or exciting about the team, which is mainly done as caricature. There's the immature computer hacker who drinks orange soda, the femme fatale who seduces men into deals they shouldn't make, and an escape artist who is blond and lithe and seems to have studied every one of Uma Thurman's moves.

In brooding about the current financial meltdown, the question occurs: Why is it we are supposed to believe that the same "experts" who led us down the path to financial ruin are capable of constructing strategies, policies and bailouts that will turn us around and head us toward solvency? It makes no sense. We are assured that Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is on top of things because he won his spurs as a scholar of the Great Depression. This isn't a replay of the 1930s, though; it's something new, something perhaps even bigger.

Will it ever end? For more than a year, the financial system has struggled to function, stricken as it is with economic Ebola. Cash is the only cure, and banks have raised almost $400 billion. That's not nearly enough, however, so the federal government has committed to various bailouts that will cost hundreds of billions over time. The most expensive yet - a new super-agency to buy bad debt - may eventually cost north of $1 trillion. As bad as the situation is, we're in deeper trouble than most realize.

By all indications, Joe Flacco's enforced absence from the latest Ravens minicamp at the Castle isn't going to throw the new regime's plans out of whack. He's not allowed to be here this week, but the Ravens inserted a camp in a couple of weeks to make up for it. As for any contract problems delaying his arrival in training camp in July, nothing about the early stages of negotiations raises red flags. "They have a ton of leverage," Joe Linta, Flacco's agent, said yesterday, "and we have a ton of leverage.

History isn't supposed to repeat, but investors this year may have the feeling that they've been here before. U.S. and most foreign stock markets are off to a strong start, the same as in 2006. And Wall Street's primary obsession remains whether the Federal Reserve is finished tightening credit. When Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke testified before Congress last week, much of his commentary was right in line with the economic "soft landing" forecast that underlies the bullish case for stocks.

Of the things you can't question about defensive tackle Kelly Gregg - like his relentlessness, his passion and his significance to the Ravens - add another no-no: his toughness. On a second down and 10 from the Cincinnati Bengals' 27-yard line Sunday, running back Rudi Johnson took a handoff toward the middle of the line of scrimmage before bouncing to the left and getting tackled by Gregg and linebacker Adalius Thomas after a 5-yard gain. During the play, Johnson's knee hit Gregg's helmet, and the 6-foot, 310-pound lineman appeared to sway after standing up. Although Gregg returned to the line in anticipation of the next play, Ravens coaches ordered him off the field.

The Washington Redskins' statement game today will end in either an exclamation point or a question mark. Washington travels to the Meadowlands to meet the New York Giants at 1 p.m. in a game that could go a long way toward determining who has a foothold in the contentious NFC East. Redskins@Giants Today, 1 p.m., chs. 45, 5, 1430 AM, 106.7 FM Line: Giants by 2

Negotiating the best price on goods and services can be an art form. And unless you're in a bartering business, you may feel inept at haggling. For tips, we turned to two professional negotiators. Both are certified purchasing managers and members of the Institute for Supply Management: Jim Haining, director of procurement at Insituform Technologies, a sewer-repair company near St. Louis, and Carol Marks, director of purchasing for an Industrial Distribution Group facility in Belmont, N.C. Have a plan.