InfatuationsSome weeks, it’s impossible not to feel the love. Christian conservative Pat Robertson embraced gay-friendly divorcé Rudy Giuliani. Rudy stood by former police commissioner Bernard Kerik, though it didn’t stop a grand jury from indicting Kerik for tax evasion and conspiracy. Most-eligible bachelor Mike Bloomberg inspired Newsweek to run a mash note about his presidential prospects on its cover, while the Post refused to believe the mayor wasn’t pining for Eliot Spitzer’s job, even after he declared, “I categorically will not run for governor.”
it happened this week
Hanging On
It was a week for struggling to maintain control. Hillary Clinton swerved all over the road at the Democratic debate, explaining how she supported Governor Spitzer’s licenses-for-immigrants plan while simultaneously opposing it. Mayor Bloomberg, anticipating a drop in tax revenues, instituted a preemptive hiring freeze. Vice-President Dick Cheney spent a day hunting near Poughkeepsie, withholding comment about his hosts’ Confederate décor.
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HauntedIn a week filled with political trickery, Hillary Clinton lugged home a goody bag stuffed with treats: Barack Obama’s spooky attack ads on her Iran-resolution vote failed to gain traction, Elvis Costello haunted her 60th-birthday fête at the Beacon Theatre, and Rudy Giuliani announced he’s rooting for the Red Sox in the World Series (“I go with the American League team,” he explained). Governor Spitzer got t.p.’d by the State Senate on his alien-I.D. plan, though former police commissioner William Bratton said it sounded okay to him. Current police commish Ray Kelly drove a stake through the hearts of supporters by announcing that he had “no desire” to run for mayor.
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Law and OrderFor one week, our left-leaning metropolis tilted slightly to the right. Former mayor Rudy Giuliani reminisced fondly about the time he chucked Yasser Arafat out of Lincoln Center, and Fred Thompson spoke to city conservatives. Briefly disgraced chatterbox Don Imus reportedly secured a new deal that will put him on WABC, replacing lefty lawyer Ron Kuby, while rumors of a right-wing attack on Air America host Randi Rhodes proved to be somewhat exaggerated. (She actually fell on 39th Street.)
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Mouthing OffA noose dangling from the door of an African-American Columbia professor’s office was the only thing that kept Yankees manager Joe Torre off the front pages this week. Rudy Giuliani pleaded with a capricious higher power — God, that is, not George Steinbrenner — to save his pin-striped pal’s job (he’d already said he’d appoint Torre to his Cabinet if given the chance). Mayor Bloomberg, displaying the tendency to be not totally insane that has set him apart from his predecessor time and again, merely remarked that “you can have great people and great coaching and it’s just not meant to be.”
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Who Do You Like?As Indian summer continued its extended run last week, some of the most popular kids in town found themselves getting the cold shoulder. A federal lawsuit charged Bloomberg LP discriminates against pregnant women, and BMOC Mike Bloomberg promptly reminded us that he no longer runs his namesake company. (Later in the week, a little red in the face, he admitted he regularly talks to senior executives there.) Onetime Most Likely to Succeed Barack Obama fell 33 points behind Hillary Clinton in the latest presidential poll.
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On the Firing Line
In a week when much of the world came to midtown, the boldest names were to be found on campus. Hillary Clinton held up under heavy grilling at the Dartmouth debates, while Columbia University president Lee Bollinger invited Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad uptown, then called him a “petty and cruel dictator.” (For his part, Ahmadinejad denied that his country contained such dangerous American inventions as nuclear weapons and homosexuals.) Potential First Husband Bill was joined at his Global Initiative conference by poverty experts Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. The former commander-in-chief also declared war, unsuccessfully, on Village eatery Osso Buco for hanging a promotional photo of daughter Chelsea in its front window.
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Thinking Big
Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s request to lay a wreath at ground zero was the unlikeliest wish in a week of ambitious schemes. Hillary Clinton took a second swing at universal health care, laying out a $110 billion program. Rudy Giuliani crossed the pond to London to rub shoulders with Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair, and Gordon Brown, then suggested that Israel join nato. Dan Rather sued CBS for $70 million.
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Moving Along
The sixth anniversary of 9/11 came and went, with what has come to pass for normality on the city’s darkest date: a walk-through at ground zero for victims’ families, and Rudy Giuliani observing a rare moment of silence. Just like old times, a suspicious powder turned up in the mail room at the Standard & Poor’s offices. Census data found that blacks appear to be leaving the city — an exodus that may increase after 704 code violations were found at a single Harlem apartment building. The toxic oil spill under Greenpoint was discovered to be bigger than anyone had imagined. HIV infections were once again on the rise.
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Hitting the RoadAs a halfhearted cabbie strike made it easier to flag down a school bus than a yellow taxi during rush hour last week, the Big Apple did its best to keep moving forward. Hillary out-earned rivals Barack Obama and Rudy Giuliani in the city during the second quarter — and bested Rudy in a poll asking which candidate people would most like to have riding shotgun on a long road trip — but hit a speed bump trying to maintain her distance from former six-figure fund-raiser and felon Norman Hsu, who skipped out on bail.
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Dark Skies
A stretch of freakishly cold and rainy August weather seemed all too appropriate for a week of unseasonably chilling news. A blaze at the Deutsche Bank building, unoccupied since 9/11, killed two firemen, possibly as a result of criminal negligence and the lack of a pre-fire plan. The CIA admitted that pretty much every spy this side of James Bond had viewed a 2000 report about two of the future Twin Towers attackers — and none had mentioned it to the FBI. Attorneys for Bernard Spitzer (father of Eliot) released tapes of a threatening phone message that referred to his “psycho, piece-of-shit son.” (The call came from the line of Republican strategist Roger Stone, who said someone had broken into his apartment to frame him while he was at Frost/Nixon — though it turns out there wasn’t a performance on the night in question.) Stone was subsequently fired by his client, Joe Bruno.
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Moving On
As the city draped itself in black last week to mourn the death of its unofficial monarch, Brooke Astor, stock-market troubles aside, the summer’s darkest days otherwise seemed to have passed. A dirty-bomb scare was canceled for lack of interest (or evidence), and Lexington Avenue reopened at 41st Street for the first time since the steam-pipe explosion, which most of us thought was terrorism at the time. The federal government promised Mayor Bloomberg $350 million for congestion pricing (pending Albany approval).
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Round Round
In a week in which a freak twister whipped through Brooklyn, downing trees and smashing cars, everything seemed like it was spinning, starting with the MTA PR department after the same tornado-producing storm washed out the subway system. (They blamed the city’s clogged drains.) Thrice-married adulterer Rudy Giuliani talked in circles when asked if he considers himself a “traditional Catholic”; his daughter Caroline sent heads whirling by linking to a Barack Obama booster site on her Facebook page. Team Obama played down reports that its candidate had pulled a 180 by backing out of a fund-raiser at midtown’s extremely Caucasian Harmonie Club. Mayor Bloomberg, who quit the Harmonie before running for mayor, was called for jury duty downtown and didn’t seem too upset about being blackballed from an asbestos case.
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Flip-Flop Weather
Citizens left the city in droves as August began, apparently fleeing the cloud of uncertainty that seemed to have settled over the city. Governor Spitzer called the appointment of a special prosecutor in the Joe Bruno investigation “unnecessary,” then offered to testify under oath. The families of 9/11 victims were told that this year’s anniversary would not be marked at ground zero, but then it was announced they’d convene at a spot overlooking the site.
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Steamed
The city was shaken last week when an explosion tore open the ground near Grand Central and spewed scalding vapor into the midtown sky, but steam was being blown off everywhere. The Dow broke 14,000. Mayor Bloomberg unloaded on Albany Democrats for screwing up his deal for federal transportation funds, but steamroller Governor Spitzer helped pave the way to a compromise. Would-be First Lady Elizabeth Edwards slammed Senator Clinton for not standing up for women. Rudy Giuliani made his first extended tour of Iowa, taking time to praise two forces unpopular in NYC: nuclear power and Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia. Andrew Cuomo sued ExxonMobil to clean out Greenpoint.
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Oven Fresh
Mother nature cooked up a heat wave to celebrate last week’s 30th anniversary of the ’77 blackout, but GOP front-runner Rudy Giuliani was feeling hot under the collar. The top national firefighters union dubbed the ex-mayor’s 9/11 heroics an “urban legend,” while the name of his southern campaign director, Louisiana U.S. senator David Vitter, turned up in a D.C. madam’s little black book. (“He’s not a freak,” attested a New Orleans brothel owner in Vitter’s defense.) While Eliot Spitzer and Joe Bruno’s feud turned up the heat in Albany, State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver stood firm between Mayor Bloomberg (who was hanging with his fellow moguls in Sun Valley) and a half-billion dollars in federal traffic-decongestant funds.
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Home of the Brave
As the rockets’ red glare faded over New York Harbor and the city awaited the auspicious date of 7/7/07, residents had reason to feel lucky. Bombs bursting in air were a somewhat ominous reminder of the bungled London terror attacks, and, in the patriotic spirit of things, no one seemed to mind waiting as suspicious packages along the West Side Highway, on Liberty Island, and at JFK airport were examined. (The last threat turned out to be a big box of cologne.) Senator Hillary Clinton made good on threats to unleash husband Bill to march with baton twirlers in Iowa, but Barack Obama rained on her parade by raising $32 million to her $27 million in the second quarter of the year.
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iPhone Is Here
This week’s issue of New York is a double issue, which means no issue next week, which means no “It Happened This Week” today. But that’s okay; we don’t need one. We all know what happened this week: The iPhone went on sale. iPhone! iPhone! iPhone iPhone iPhone. Remember how a few hours ago we told you there was virtually no line at several AT&T stores? Yeah, we just checked the one closest to the office — that’s at Madison and 46th — and, well, not so much anymore.
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Road Trip As the city was drenched alternately by rain and perspiration, Mayor Bloomberg fanned presidential-run rumors by lighting out for the Western territories and announcing that he’d cooled on the Republican Party. The mayor’s greenhouse-gas-battling congestion-pricing plan hit Albany gridlock. After a Harlem assemblyman accused Governor Spitzer of “acting like a Democratic Giuliani,” South Carolina police arrested the real Giuliani’s state campaign chief for acting like a Republican Pablo Escobar, charging him with cocaine distribution. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly mandated that cops who fire a gun will henceforth be tested for a different controlled substance, namely booze.
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Hot Town
Rudy Giuliani’s overheated twelve-point plan promising a little something for everyone was nicely in the spirit of a week characterized by hot air. Hillary Clinton felt a warming trend in Hollywood and bagged the presidential endorsement of Steven Spielberg. J.Lo and Marc Anthony, Puerto Rican Day Parade caliente surprise guests, were not among the 208 spectators arrested, who the police insisted were mostly gang members. Property-tax payers and library users were the big winners in the city budget passed by Mayor Bloomberg and Speaker Christine Quinn. Governor Spitzer got fired up about legalizing medical marijuana for “life-threatening” conditions.
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Get a Life
With public enemy no. 1, Paris Hilton, temporarily behind bars, the city turned its attention to more-mundane threats — like the alleged plot to blow up JFK airport. For Mr. 9/11, Rudy Giuliani, the foiled plan confirmed that he was the only presidential candidate qualified to keep the country safe — or to use the phrase Islamic terrorist, for that matter. “If you hear them utter those words,” he said of debating Democrats, “give me credit for it.” Budget officials warned that scary $3 subway fares were in the offing but estimated that some of that cost could be offset by making the city a gay-wedding destination. The other option is Rollerblading everywhere: The city’s transportation commissioner seemed open to closing Central Park to auto traffic during the summer.
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Airborne
Any week in which scalpers can demand five figures to hear The Police play “Every Breath You Take” at the Garden and the pollen count goes through the roof is bound to leave the city gasping for air. The world’s most dangerous tuberculosis patient stopped into town for three days of quarantine at Bellevue. Mayor Bloomberg opened a gigantic walk-in asthma clinic in East Harlem. Pretend Manhattan district attorney Fred Thompson moved closer to joining the presidential race, leaving real-life Big Apple crime-buster Rudy Giuliani no time to catch his breath.
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On the Town
The arrival of Fleet Week’s giddy sailors on shore leave marked a summery spate of punch-drunk recklessness, with five intoxicated Long Islanders starting a brawl at Space Mountain at Disney World and Jets cornerback Justin Miller hitting a female Barack Obama staffer in the face at a Chelsea nightclub. And it just got odder from there: A coyote bit a kindergartner on the head in the Jersey suburbs. A 60-year-old woman delivered twins, to the displeasure of her adult children. (“It’s my life and it makes me happy,” explained the new mom.)
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Turning Green
It was a spring week in which green was bursting out all over. Mayor Bloomberg hosted a global environmental sleepover; Bill Clinton, sounding more Gore-like every day, came down from Harlem to tout the mayor’s congestion-pricing plan. Rudy Giuliani revealed that he’s earned $17 million since last year and picked up bonus 9/11 hero points by tearing into a fellow Republican debater who suggested that the U.S. in some way invited the attacks. Jerry Falwell, who blamed the towers’ fall on Gotham’s immoral minority, passed on to a better place.
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Forever
It was a good week to consider one’s legacy, as the world’s most beautiful women Scarlett, J.Lo, Cameron, et al. descended on the Met decked out in some of the world’s shiniest dresses to honor a long-dead, but once terribly important, French designer. Mayor Bloomberg spent the week giving high marks to himself, for fulfilling campaign promises. But he denied that he was seeking immortality in Albany by gunning for Eliot Spitzer’s job in 2010. (State Republican chief Joseph Bruno’s insistence notwithstanding, Mayor Mike said any reports of Albany envy were “totally made up.”)
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Taking It Easy
There was something inspiring in New Jersey governor Jon Corzine’s insouciance last week: rising from his deathbed, paying a photo-op $46 fine for violating the seat-belt law, and then speeding off toward home at 70 miles per hour. His predecessor, Jim McGreevey, nonchalantly announced that he planned to study for the Episcopalian priesthood (in laid-back Chelsea, no less). New York governor Eliot Spitzer raised reelection funds in California; fellow Dems back in Albany grumbled about his sudden devil-may-care attitude toward campaign-finance reform.
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Green Days
Just in time for sudden-onset spring, Mayor Bloomberg unveiled his ambitious 2030 plan, which called for a greener Apple — Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff promised arboreal enhancement “every single place where it is possible to plant a street tree” — and an $8 tax on people who drive into the city. (Staten Island retaliated with a project to up its “downtown cool” quotient.) President Bush stumped for No Child Left Behind in Harlem, sat for the Charlie Rose treatment at the Waldorf-Astoria, and stopped in at a $1 million meet-and-greet at 740 Park Avenue, hosted by old Skull and Bones chum Steve Schwarzman.
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Losses
In a week when the Dow hit a record high and Manhattanites sought tax-season shelter, everyone was rethinking their fiscal strategies. The bottom line of a police investigation into the crash of New Jersey governor and former Goldman Sachs chief Jon Corzine was that he would have profited from buckling up and not being driven 91 miles per hour. The Reverend Al Sharpton hedged, then divested himself of plans to salute rap mogul L.A. Reid (whose portfolio of labels includes Roc-A-Fella). Small-cap-eschewing retiree Don Imus, old enough to cash in his 401(k), insisted that “I could go to work tomorrow. Bigger deal. More money.” Forbes investor Bono’s Spider-Man musical will reportedly make its initial public offering in July.
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The Bard
The comedy of errors that led to the tragic fifth act of talk radio’s King Lear, Don Imus, set the stage for a most Shakespearean week. Imus, who lost his multimedia kingdom for his comment about “nappy-headed hos,” lent his earphones to the Falstaffian Reverend Al Sharpton, who proceeded to bury him, not to praise him. New Jersey governor Jon Corzine was en route to broker peace between Imus and the Rutgers players but wound up in a condition of the worst degree.
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Shekels
The combined holy powers of Easter and Passover together couldn’t prevent April’s week-that’s-all-about- money from coming early this year. Rather than respectfully waiting until Tax Day, the root of all evil crept its way into the headlines last week. Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani didn’t hold off till April 15, Federal Election Commission Filing Day, to announce their first-quarter contributions: $26 million for HRC and $15 million for Rudy, placing him between Mitt Romney (!) and John McCain. Barack Obama cleverly waited to announce his own number — $25 million. That surprised nearly everyone, except maybe billionaire Obama pal David Geffen, who lost out on his dream of owning the L.A. Times to another billionaire, Chicagoan Sam Zell.
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The Most Important Meal
Some weeks just roll out like an endless breakfast buffet in the Big Scrapple. Campaign dough nut Hillary Clinton raked in a record $10 million in cash in one week thanks largely to cereal-aisle mogul Ron Burkle but her decaffeinated Iraq withdrawal plan, which many called a gigantic waffle, did not go over easy in Washington. A drug dealer in a jam briefly made instant oatmeal of the Sean Bell case by claiming Bell had peppered him with gunfire last summer; the ReverendAl Sharpton said it was all a shmear campaign. The estranged attorney of subway hero Wesley Autrey (who surely eats his Wheaties) called his lifesaving leap onto the tracks “stupid.”
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Digits
As word leaked out that 50,000 Manhattanites were to be zoned out of the exclusive 10021 Zip Code on the Upper East Side—have that mail forwarded to 10075, Mayor Mike!—the city played by the numbers. The tabloids devoted 24/7 coverage and 72-point headlines to Naomi Campbell’s sanitation gig at Pier 36. (Day-two stories zeroed in on her $1,000 Christian Louboutin boots and $1,500 Azzedine Alaïa coat.) The State Legislature passed a bill moving the 2008 presidential primary up to 2/5, a move that should aid both 9/11 hero Rudy Giuliani (whose wife, Judi, revealed that Rudy is her third husband) and seven-year New York resident Hillary Clinton. Clinton was attacked as 1984’s Big Brother in a Web ad orchestrated by YouTuber ParkRidge47, who was 86’d from his company, which is doing work for Barack Obama.
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Rose-Colored Glasses
As temperatures soared into the surreal realm of the high sixties last week, some wishful thinking seemed in order. Senator Hillary Clinton confidently dusted off her “vast right-wing conspiracy” theory, then proudly previewed a new Iraq strategy based largely on optimistic dreams. State Senator Joseph Bruno believed that the best way to negotiate with Eliot Spitzer was by telling him that Assembly leaders “are so far up your ass it’s ridiculous.” Al Sharpton assured the press that Barack Obama called him, that he returned the call, and that he expected another call momentarily.
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Baby, It’s the Predictable Headline
There was a double issue of the magazine on Monday, which means no new issue next Monday, which means no “It Happened This Week.” (Funny, from where we sit, it seems like an awful lot happened this week. Apparently not.) Have a good weekend — the forecast high is 50 degrees tomorrow — and we’ll catch you Monday.
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Mean Streets
Was it any coincidence that three days after Martin Scorsese finally took home his Academy Award for Best Director, Wall Street’s Raging Bull suddenly stumbled? Probably, but then Scorsesesque plot twists abounded this week. A couple of GoodFellas, sons of made man Joe Colombo, were cleared of federal charges of extortion and racketeering. A judge ruled that an 1851 law limiting the city’s damages in the Staten Island Ferry crash was the stupidest nineteenth-century cap he’d seen since Gangs of New York. Hillary Clinton’s staff dropped its usual Travis Bickle–ish “You talkin’ to me?” stance when asked why she’d five times neglected to mention a family charity on her Senate ethics forms, instead admitting that one of these days she had to get herself organizized. The Color of Money beckoned her fellow Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards to Murray Hill, hat in hand, to tell New York Stories and apologize for his Iraq-war vote.
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Good Times
It was a week of unbridled revelry. Barack Obama was fêted at a DreamWorks gala in Hollywood, but Democratic Party pooper Hillary Clinton’s spokesman demanded that he return his $1.3 million present. War on terror rush chairman Dick Cheney cheered Tony Blair’s withdrawal of British troops from Iraq, calling it “an affirmation that there are parts of Iraq where things are going pretty well.” City Council Speaker Christine Quinn sent wounded city soldiers recuperating in Texas gift baskets from Zabar’s to remind them of home.
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Candyland
With the arrival (at last) of a light frosting of snow (that quickly turned into a Slushee), New York indulged its sweet tooth. Albany’s Three Musketeers — Silver, Bruno, and Spitzer — engaged in a taffy pull over control of the State Legislature, with Bruno accusing the governor of thinking he was Willy Wonka, and treating the legislators like Oompa-Loompas. Silver and his new political sugar-pie, Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, received a threatening Candygram containing a suspicious non-confectioner’s powder. The Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama presidential campaigns traded Zingers over which candidate wants to get us out of Iraq S’more.
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Love Story
As Valentine’s Day approached, an otherwise frigid week steamed with passion. Unlike her waffling-on-’08 sweetie, Judi Giuliani had no problem declaring — her affection for her snuggle bug, that is. “Rudy’s a very, very romantic guy,” she gushed, as the Postran a massive make-out cover photo of the pair. “We love watching Sleepless in Seattle.” The State Assembly played hard-to-get with Governor Eliot Spitzer (a real Mr. Darcy type), whose Match.com-style tactics in choosing his former flame Alan Hevesi’s replacement as comptroller were spurned for an arranged marriage with a financial-management virgin from Long Island. Heartbroken Mayor Bloomberg pined for $300 million in city funds lost in the new state budget, sobbing, “Does anyone believe we’ll ever get them back?”
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The Erector Set
The opening of several exhibitions seeking to rehab the legacy of the city’s master builder, Robert Moses, kicked off a parade of heavy construction equipment last week. Governor Eliot Spitzer told an Albany adversary, “I’m a fucking steamroller — and I’ll roll over you and anybody else!” Senator Hillary Clinton erected a towering lead in New Hampshire polls, just as Joe Biden undermined the foundations of his newly declared presidential candidacy by clumsily complimenting Barack Obama’s apparently unusual articulateness and personal hygiene. Former governor George Pataki, whose own Washington aspirations might be compared to building castles in the air, delayed his campaign’s ribbon-cutting ceremony yet again.
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Not in Kansas
Senator Hillary Clinton’s disclosure that The Wizard of Oz was one of her three favorite movies set the week’s tone in the Emerald City. Clinton adopted a quiet, “I’ll get you, my pretty” strategy versus the Democrats’ newfound Glinda, Barack Obama, while pushing her new Technicolor personality via Web chats. Importing courageous subway hero Wesley Autrey to Washington for the State of the Union address didn’t help President George W. Bush’s popularity or the reception of his Iraq surge plan. Dick Cheney blew up like a twister on Wolf Blitzer when questioned about his impending granddaughter’s links to Friends of Dorothy, while Cheney’s former Toto, Scooter Libby, told prosecutors he’d been “sacrificed” to save Bush’s man behind the curtain, Karl Rove.
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There’s Nothing to See Here
Monday’s issue of New York was a double issue, meaning no new mag next week — and, therefore, inherently, that nothing happened this week. We’ll see you Monday.
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Marvels
The revelation that mild-mannered Mayor Bloomberg, the Bruce Wayne of Gotham City, keeps a Batphone in his kitchen was a clear Batsignal that we’ve been overrun by superheroes. Wonder Twins Barbara Walters and Rosie O’Donnell stopped squabbling long enough to join forces against Donald Trump, who, with his Magneto-like ability to attract reporters, poked fun at Rosie’s incredible bulk. Nets All-Star Jason Kidd, as bald as Lex Luthor, claimed in a divorce filing that his 105-pound wife Joumana’s superpowers included punching, kicking, and the ability to throw “nearby household objects.” (Her lawyer, Raoul Felder, a.k.a. the Punisher, dismissed such talk as “the realm of fantasy.”) Onetime defender of the weak Jeanine Pirro, whose Spidey sense tingles whenever she suspects hubby Al is playing Dr. Octopus, signed on to host a daytime talk show.
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What Goes Up
In the days following the synchronized New Year’s drops of the Times Square glitter ball and Britney Spears onto the floor of a dance club, everyone seemed to be feeling gravity’s pull. Ex-mayor Rudy Giuliani’s presidential momentum took a swan dive when a copy of his campaign battle plan fell into the wrong hands. (In it, he’d singled out Bernard Kerik and ex-wife Donna Hanover as two things likely to weigh him down.) New governor Eliot Spitzer, possibly fearing an approval-ratings plunge after Jimmy Fallon’s inaugural comedy routine tanked, proposed a $6 billion diminution in property taxes and hinted that predecessor George Pataki had sunk New York into a “Rip Van Winkle”-like sleep for “much of the past decade.”
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Nut Jobs
Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” was tapped as a finalist for the Grammy for Record of the Year, which certainly seemed appropriate, since, as 2006 ran out, the whole world appeared headed for a rubber room. Presidential front-runner John McCain, sometimes accused of having a few screws loose, told the Yeshiva University Hanukkah Convention that Iran’s leaders were “possibly deranged.” Tehran rebutted the charge by hosting a convention of Holocaust deniers, including an Israeli-flag-burning Rockland County rabbi and kooky ex-Klansman David Duke. Leisure nut President Bush decided he’d be out of his mind to try to tackle the Iraq problem before the New Year. Mowaffak al-Rubaie, Iraq’s national-security adviser, suggested that his country’s lunatic army take over the asylum of Baghdad. Mayor Bloomberg painted a Hieronymus Bosch scenario of the city’s future including insane all-day rush hours circa 2030 then unveiled some out-there solutions that seemed just crazy enough to work. A British tabloid floated the wacky idea that the U.S. intelligence services were holding secret info on paranoid Princess Di that could cause “exceptionally grave damage to the national security.”
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Figure It Out
As the number of shopping days till Christmas dwindled, the ten magi of the Baker-Hamilton commission told Bush 43 that he had “one last chance” to get Iraq straightened out and suggested that most troops come home within fifteen months. Other surprising figures popped up: The Senate confirmed Defense Secretary-nominee Robert Gates by a vote of 95 to 2 after he said that Saddam Hussein had no 9/11 connection. (The president called Gates the right man to tackle “the emerging threats of the 21st century,” leaving some to wonder where he’d been six years ago.) Hillary Clinton seemed ready to commit 110 percent to a 2008 presidential campaign, planning strategic visits to Iowa and New Hampshire and telling one pol, “I’m really going to go for this.” Meanwhile, her potential rival, Barack Obama (and many Dems’ No. 1 fantasy), gave at a $2,500-a-plate Manhattan charity dinner.
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When in Rome
For VII days, all roads seemed to lead to Rome. Emperor George Bush suffered an Et tu? moment when Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki stuck a last-minute dagger in his plans for a triumphant triumvirate dinner. The Baker-Hamilton commission recommended pulling the Army legions out of Iraq; the Pentagon’s Cincinnatus, Colin Powell, crossed the rhetorical Rubicon and called the conflict a civil war. (The president declared that the die was cast, and that “we can accept nothing less than victory.”) Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad asked Americans to lend him their ears, so that he could explain how the U.S. is too supportive of Zionists. Homeland Security gladiator Michael Chertoff offered a mea culpa for throwing New York City’s anti-terror funding to the lions.
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Action Heroes
It was a week of high adventure as our Indiana Jones–like ex-mayor Rudy Giuliani formed an exploratory committee for a presidential run. Swashbuckling Establishment guy James Baker, who rescued the 2000 election for George W. Bush, was brave enough to suggest that Iran might help save the U.S. from its quagmire in Iraq. Safariwear aficionado Mahmoud Ahmadinejad replied that he’d prefer to blow Israel into thin air with his nukes-to-be, crowing that “we will soon witness its disappearance and destruction.”
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Plowshares
A week that commenced with swords drawn concluded with olive branches extended. Republicans who’d run on President Bush’s war record received a “thumpin’” in midterm elections, leading Bush to arrange a regime change at the Pentagon. Out was warlord Donald Rumsfeld, spouter of coldblooded koans such as “Death has a tendency to encourage a depressing view of war”; in was serene ex-spook Robert Gates, who now must convince Iraqi insurgents to trade their Kalashnikovs for less-hostile playthings.
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Regrets
In a pre-election week punctuated by acts of contrition, none was sorrier than John Kerry’s mea culpa for seeming to instruct a group of college students to do their homework lest they “end up in Iraq.” Having single-handedly halted Democratic momentum, Kerry said, “I sincerely regret that my words were misinterpreted.” President Bush, who has lately donned a hair shirt over piddling aspects of his handling of the war, nevertheless vowed never to fire Rumsfeld or Cheney. Congressman Charles Rangel said he was sorry for calling the veep a “son of a bitch,” but showed no pangs of conscience for observing that Cheney hadn’t “shot anyone in the face lately.” Remorseless campaigner Andrew Cuomo showed he had no hard feelings toward ex-rival Mark Green by accepting a $50,000 donation from Green’s developer brother, Stephen, before scolding current opponent Jeanine Pirro’s “shameful” paying of her driver $148,000 in county-funded overtime.
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Adaptation
“We’ve never been ‘Stay the course’ … We’re constantly changing tactics — constantly changing tactics.” Thus spoke previously steadfast President Bush on the eve of midterm elections, and last week it was easy to tell that change was in the air. Republican Senate hopeful John Spencer speculated that Hillary Clinton had altered her once-unattractive face with “millions of dollars” of plastic surgery; an aide later clarified that position, noting that Clinton was merely “ugly — as a person.” Chauffeur-scandal-plagued State Comptroller Alan Hevesi did a U-turn and agreed to a last-minute debate against challenger Chris Callaghan, but not before shoo-in Democratic gubernatorial candidate Eliot Spitzer backed away from his formerly unswerving support.