Macho

Frederick Blickenstaff may be some $7,000 poorer but a lot wiser after confronting another man in a traffic dispute a little over a week ago. According to an article by Sun reporter Amy L. Miller, Blickrude gesture" -- I think we're talking about a classic finger salute here -- as he went by.Blickenstaff followed and flashed his lights. Both men stopped and argued, got back in their vehicles and drove off. Before too long they stopped and were at it again -- fighting with shovels. The man allegedly sprayed Blickenstaff with a "Mace-type chemical" and then set fire to his truck, causing $5,000 damage to the truck and $2,000 damage to some tools therein.

A few weeks ago, I was invited to speak to a group of students at a youth arts program in West Baltimore. I was given carte blanche to hold forth on the topic of my choice, so I chose personal narratives - specifically, the benefits of effectively communicating who you are, where you come from and where you'd like to go. It's a skill that's useful during a range of interactions, from first dates to job interviews, enlisting others to help you reach...

If the Oakland Athletics were playing the macho game Friday night, as the Orioles obviously believed, all they proved is how stupid that act can get.On the two pitches he saw as the leadoff hitter in the ninth inning, Rafael Palmeiro looked like a moving target. The first sailed behind him, the next didn't miss.To his credit, the Orioles first baseman gave his best Don Baylor impersonation by flipping away his bat and trotting to first base. He would later score his club's final run, which is the best means of retaliation.

Yes, Rick Perry might seem a little, well, out there with some of his public statements. But the Texas governor has something that our current commanded-in-chief lacks: Overt machismo.  And this cannot be underestimated. Macho men have a long history of winning elections. George W. Bush played the macho guy well, always clearing brush on his Texas ranch and challenging terrorists with tough-guy statements ("Bring 'em on," "Smoke 'em out"). Vladimir Putin is so macho his vacations include tiger hunting, judo tournaments and riding horses.

It WAS a Sunday night. I was home early from my weekend job, so I had a chance to sit back, relax and watch my main man, Sean Connery, in "Outland." Or so I thought.At about 9:30 my son came storming into the house. "Dad!" he shouted, "That man down the street hit me!""What man?" I asked."Al's father!"(Al is not the real name of the boy whose father hit my son. It has been changed to spare the lad the embarrassGregory P.Kanement of having large numbers of people know his father is an idiot.

MEXICO CITY -- The macho Mexican male, that oversexed, philandering, self-described king of the Latin world, is having trouble at home.No longer can he count on an adoring wife and a bevy of young mistresses.The women are getting fed up, and so are some of the men.The archetypal mustachioed hombre once strutted through life packing a pistol to symbolize his sexual potency.Today the pistola has been replaced by a cellular phone.The macho ideal was Pancho Villa, the turn-of-the century revolutionary general who married 21 times and had hundreds of lovers.

Macho Again came to Baltimore last week unheralded, unproven and virtually unnoticed. By the time the gray, Florida-bred colt finished the Preakness yesterday, he at last had some renown, even if it came in Big Brown's shadow. Second place, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. "This is kind of the best second place I've ever had," jockey Julien Leparoux said after Macho Again beat Icabad Crane and Racecar Rhapsody to the wire -- more than five lengths behind Big Brown. "I don't like to be second, but it's not bad to be second to this horse."

In the competition between the sexes, women continue to win the longevity race, living on average about seven years longer than men.Now psychologists offer an explanation that might help explain the gap. They say a large part of men's life-expectancy handicap is due to macho behavior.Macho means "almost a caricature" of masculine traits, says William Pollack, a psychologist at Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, Mass., and McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass.It means using physical force instead of thought, Mr. Pollack says, playing the role of a loner and putting a lid on almost all emotions.

The number of poor is soaring. Most don't vote. If they did, it would be for none of the above.U.S. armed forces, flush from victory in the Persian Gulf, have occupied South Florida, where they will remain past Election Day.Macho baseball owners don't want a commissioner named Fay who is no patsy.

Quote: "I don't need to be a macho guy or some kind of he-man. It was hurting some, so I figured why risk it? It's not that serious. I just want to be able to pitch when it's not so painful." - The Braves' Kevin Millwood, after leaving with a knee injury after six shutout innings against the Padres It's a fact: The Cardinals have hit a league-leading 185 home runs and are on pace to break the 1998 franchise mark of 223. Who's hot: The Braves' Andres Galarraga, whose three-run homer Tuesday accounted for all of Atlanta's runs, hit a bases-empty shot yesterday.

Trainer Kathy Ritvo, all 5 feet of her, stands on her toes in the Preakness barn at Pimlico Race Course and reaches up to the massive horse known as Mucho Macho Man. "You need a hug," she says, stretching her arms to encircle his face. Mucho Macho Man puts his ears back and gives her a look. Ritvo, dressed in jeans and Kentucky Derby jacket, shakes her long blond hair and laughs. "I say, 'You need a hug.' And he says, 'Scram,'" she said. "But isn't he a handsome horse?"

Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom was made an early 2-1 favorite for the 136th running of the Preakness Stakes after the post position draw on Wednesday. The chestnut colt, who is ridden by jockey John Velazquez and trained by Maryland's Graham Motion, will run against a full field of 14 horses. It's the first time the Preakness has had a full field since 2005. Animal Kingdom drew the No. 11 post position in the draw, a development Motion said he was the best possible outcome for his horse.

"Man up, Harry Reid," Republican senatorial candidate and tea party darling Sharron Angle recently said in one of the more sexually telling comments about the current state of American politics. Ever since the gender gap was discovered by pollsters in the 1980s, it has been accepted wisdom that a majority of American men support Republicans, while a preponderance of women back Democrats. Republicans have been called the "daddy" party, supporting a strong defense, and Democrats have been deemed the "mommy" party, supporting social welfare priorities.

In the recent past, lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender issues were only part of the National Football League landscape when a player held a news conference to assure fans that, despite the rumors, he was not gay. But as a direct result of the movement for marriage equality, there are green shoots for social justice becoming visible in the locker room. Baltimore Ravens three-time Pro Bowl linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo came out for full marriage equality, writing in the Huffington Post: "Looking at the former restrictions on human rights in our country starting with slavery, women not being able to vote, blacks being counted as two-thirds of a human, segregation ... all have gone by the wayside.

Macho Again came to Baltimore last week unheralded, unproven and virtually unnoticed. By the time the gray, Florida-bred colt finished the Preakness yesterday, he at last had some renown, even if it came in Big Brown's shadow. Second place, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. "This is kind of the best second place I've ever had," jockey Julien Leparoux said after Macho Again beat Icabad Crane and Racecar Rhapsody to the wire -- more than five lengths behind Big Brown. "I don't like to be second, but it's not bad to be second to this horse."

The brilliance of outsider bad boy Ryan Atwood - played on The O.C. by 26-year-old actor Ben McKenzie - isn't in his subtle complexity, his dramatic intensity or his emotional honesty. Nor is it the fact that, according to both television critics and teenage girls, he bears a passing physical resemblance to a young Russell Crowe. Instead, the brilliance of Ryan Atwood can be summed up thusly: The man loves Journey. "Do not insult Journey, all right?" he tells Seth, his best friend, as they speed to the airport with the car radio blasting, hoping to stop a girl from boarding a plane and leaving Newport Beach.

JOE Camel is in the news again. They used to say he was pitching Camels to the kids. And now they're saying he's making camel's eyes at the girls.Sometimes a guy feels he just can't win.Last year Joe Camel -- half human, half Bactrian, whose parentage defies examination -- underwent a transformation. Previously, we all knew Joe as a typical macho male. Joe astride his Harley. Joe with his top-gun Navy buddies. Joe in the pool hall. Joe the Cool Character in dark shades. Joe of the pubescent muzzle.

BOSTON -- It's barely a week since Bill Clinton took that ill-fated trip down Greg Norman's steps. But the post-op president has already gone off to Helsinki with his brace, his wheelchair and his crutches, thus adding jet lag to a list of symptoms long enough to turn any commander-in-chief into an unhappy camper.The only good that will come from wheeling the leader of the Western world up to this summit is that it will make Bypass Boris look positively hale.For the rest of us, it's bad news.

Jarhead's title is slang for Marine. Anthony Swofford, or "Swoff" (Jake Gyllenhaal), tells us in the voiceover that it may derive from the "tight, high" Corps haircut and may mean that if you lift the lid of hair you find an empty jar. In this movie, that's a certainty. Jarhead might as well have been called Jughead. It's about what happens to normally messed-up American boys if you egg them on toward a testosterone-fueled insanity that only brutality can control. The setting is the first Gulf War. In that statement lies part of the problem.