As freezing temperatures and freak 40-mile-per-hour gusts came to town last week, ripping parts off several buildings, some New Yorkers wondered which way the winds were blowing. Former mayor Rudy Giuliani, who’d long had the breeze at his back in Iowa, suddenly felt the breath of Mike Huckabee on his neck (while Mitt Romney tried to win over Evangelicals wary of his Mormonism). Dan Doctoroff, Mayor Bloomberg’s right-hand man, announced he’s leaving City Hall … to become president of Bloomberg LP. As Andrew Cuomo aimed his prosecutorial bluster away from Albany and at Wall Street, Rupert Murdoch brought in his crony Robert Thomson to run the Wall Street Journal. Officials approved plans to align Washington Square Park’s fountain with the arch. Cowboy Don Imus returned to the airwaves with a multicultural posse. Ground was broken on the 7-line extension. (Next stop: 34th and Eleventh!) Cops chummed subway stations with “lost” purses and wallets, hooking both bad guys and Good Samaritans. Jeffrey Chodorow cut bait on his $8 million Wild Salmon fisheteria. Aging Yanks hurler Andy Pettitte delayed his retirement, gaining an extra $16 million for his 401(k), while Nets guard Jason Kidd showed solidarity with picketing writers by going on strike (he claimed he had a migraine). No one could decide if a YouTube video of a man getting attacked by girls on the A train was the return of “wilding” or an homage to A Clockwork Orange. Harry Potter’s Daniel Radcliffe inked a deal to show off his thespian chops—and everything else—on Broadway next year in Equus. An anonymous bidder at Sotheby’s dropped $57 million on a three-inch-tall, 5,000-year-old feline figurine. And literary lioness Elizabeth Hardwick, the polymath essayist who helped launch the New York Review of Books from her dining-room table, passed away at age 91.

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Related:

• Archive: “Intelligencer”
• Articles by Mark Adams
• Table of Contents: December 17, 2007 issue of New York | Subscribe!