The New York Observer (New York, NY) back issues from July 2008:
Kendall Stewart, Mr. Million.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Kendall Stewart, who is running for State Senate in Brooklyn, is plowing ahead with the notion that he knows how to get money for local community groups, despite the trouble two of his staffers got into for allegedly misusing public money intended for local community ...
Team Obama Goes Cherry-Picking.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The wholesale absorption of Hillary Clinton's best and brightest campaign advisers has begun. In the weeks since Mrs. Clinton officially suspended her candidacy, the Obama campaign has recruited the services of the Clinton campaign's director of national ...
Kaiser Roll.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ "For the past 15 generations, nobody in my family has had to work," said A. Laurance "Larry" Kaiser IV, the high-end Upper East Side real estate broker. "You work because you have to contribute to society." Mr. Kaiser, 66, was sitting upright in his small ...
The End of Wes Clark's V.P. Campaign.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ It may ultimately be a good thing for Barack Obama that Wesley Clark stepped into such a mess when he discussed John McCain's military service this week. The background of the Clark flap is by now familiar: On CBS' Face the Nation on Sunday, the retired ...
Wylie in Academe: Students Meet Reality On Topic of Agent.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The Columbia Publishing Course, that postgraduate rite of passage for so many of the book industry's worker bees, was the scene of a dust-up last Monday when an afternoon panel discussion took an unexpected turn. At stake was nothing less than the honor of fearsome ...
He Could Stand the Heat, Now He's in the Kitchen.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Captain Stefan Barr said the scallops at the Gramercy Tavern could use a little more salt. He's been back only a few months from his second tour in Iraq. For 10 years, he was one of the few, the proud, or, as he puts it, "the best"--a Marine. Now he lives in Soho. ...
The Man Who Plays Pat Kiernan on TV.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Every weekday morning at 7:42, the NY1 newsman Pat Kiernan does an eight-minute segment called "In the Papers" in which he summarizes important articles from that day's newspapers. It is this portion of the newscast--not "Weather on the 1's," not "The Rail and Road ...
Chris Ward Seizes WTC Reins.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Until the end of last month, Governor David Paterson had little connection in the public's mind with the World Trade Center site. Unlike his predecessor, Eliot Spitzer, he did not loudly spout off in a campaign about mismanagement downtown; and unlike former Governor ...
Meatpacking Cooked?
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Joanne Lucas shocked the New York restaurant world last week with an extraordinary announcement. After months of searching for some deep-pocketed tenant to replace the hugely celebrated restaurateur Florent Morellet, whom she infamously booted from her ...
As Bruno Exits, Real Estate Legislation Angles for Spotlight.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Each year in Albany, a multitude of bills on housing issues go through a familiar pattern: The Democratic-led Assembly, supported by affordable housing groups, passes legislation that would expand tenants' rights and protections to varying degrees, including bills ...
New Yorker Writer Flexed His Mussels.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ THE BOTTOM OF THE HARBOR By Joseph Mitchell Pantheon, 293 pages, $23 Since almost as far back as the last World War, magazine writers in New York have been trying to sound like Joseph Mitchell, who would have been 100 years old this ...
Clay Felker.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[Clay Felker: Made New York Into A Magazine By John Koblin and Spencer Morgan After Clay Felker passed away Tuesday morning in Manhattan, The Observer spoke to some who knew him well. >>READ MORE Never Hold Your Best Stuff By Peter Kaplan ...
Clay Felker: Made New York Into A Magazine.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ After Clay Felker passed away Tuesday morning in Manhattan, The Observer spoke to some who knew him well. Robert Benton The first time I ever screamed "fuck" in front of a room full of women was when I got mad at Clay at the Esquire offices. We ...
Never Hold Your Best Stuff.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ When I think of Clay Felker, which is often, it's at the Peacock Alley in the Waldorf Astoria. I had just come to The Observer in 1994 and I was scared and sweating. Clay offered to meet with me once a week and kick around story ideas. I used to bring a stack of ...
Hamptons Detox.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ A toxic mixture of dread, fear, panic, paranoia and self-doubt was brewing in my head on my way out to the Hamptons the last weekend in June. On the train, I sat on a fold-up chair next to the bathroom and listened to the contents of the bowl swish and ...
Summer Break!
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ It's double-issue time for the Observer, meaning that the regular crew will taking a break for a few days. Steve Kornacki, whose enthusiasms include the Boston Celtics and Bob Newhart records, will be minding the store. I'll be checking email periodically ...
The Candidate From Vibe.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Congressional challenger Kevin Powell of central Brooklyn is hoping to get elected to office, in part, on the strength of his association with famous people: He likes Barack Obama, and celebrities like him. "Chuck D e-mailed me today," Powell told The ...
Cheers for the Little Guy in a Big Market: Smaller Investment Sales Sail On.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Is James Nelson a Pollyanna? Mr. Nelson, a partner and managing director at Massey Knakal, believes too much is being made of the tribulations in the city's sexy, trophy-tower, over-$100 million investment sales market. And too little is being made of the ...
Carlyle Group Buys Stake in 666 Fifth Retail for $525 M.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The Carlyle Group closed Tuesday on the purchase of an interest in the retail condo at 666 Fifth Avenue, the tower that Kushner Companies bought last year for a then-record $1.8 billion, according to a source familiar with the deal. The Carlyle Group--the ...
Macklowe Moves on Drake Site, Buys Out Sole Tenant in 40 East 57th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Under the new leadership of the dashing Billy Macklowe, Macklowe Properties appears to be lumbering ahead with its complicated and complication-ridden Drake Hotel development. Either that, or Macklowe Properties is busy assembling a more lucrative parcel in ...
No Spin Zone! Brokers Brutal on Commercial Market's '08 Turn.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The commercial real estate market must really be wretched. How else to explain Cushman & Wakefield's midyear breakfast on Tuesday morning when, in Michael's glassed-in patio, a couple of ballsy brokers erupted with skepticism, calling into question their bosses' own ...
Fly Me to Montauk! Pack Ativan, Shades for the 'Anti-Jitney'.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Debbie White, an entertainment lawyer with the firm Grubman Indursky & Shire, was inside the stuffy cabin of a floating Cessna seaplane docked at Manhattan's Skyport Marina on Friday, June 27. "It's kind of hot," said Ms. White, clutching a cold beer. She was awaiting ...
Handbag Designer, 22, Nets $8.1 M.Village Townhouse.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Greenwich Village has a very young new landlord. Earlier this year, a 22-year-old handbag designer and freelance fashion writer named Charmaine Ho bought a 25-foot-wide Greek Revival townhouse on West Ninth Street. According to city records, a limited ...
De Montebello Sells East Side Co-op for $2.1 M., But Stays in Met's Neighborhood.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The fact that imperial Metropolitan Museum of Art director Philippe de Montebello is ending his 31-year tenure in just a few months is bad enough for the Upper East Side's delicate collective psyche. But what would happen to the neighborhood's sense of nobility if the ...
Rag & Bone Founder, Makeup Artisan Buy Chelsea Duplex for $4.42 M.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ It's been about seven years since David Neville founded Rag & Bone with a friend from English boarding school, but their pristine $480 split back swing dresses, $215 western shirts, $505 hooded capes and matching $215 tailored leggings are the kinds of things that get ...
Are Eight Bedrooms Enough to Break a Record? 1030 Fifth Duplex Listed for $47.5 M.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ This May, it took Christine Wasserstein less than a week to find a buyer for her $34 million apartment (which she'd kept after a divorce from New York magazine owner Bruce Wasserstein). Her neighbors at 1030 Fifth Avenue--where, for example, Diane Sawyer and Mike ...
The Afternoon Wrap: Tuesday.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The overbudget WTC redevelopment plan has its first casualty. The wings enclosing the vast concourse of Santiago Calatrava's transit terminal (rendering above) will now be non-retractable. [City Room] Alternate-side parking regulations will soon be suspended ...
Beveridge Fizzy On Future.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Location: The theme that unites the Mayor's 2030 PlaNYC is that the city will grow by about one million people in the next 25 years. Do you agree? Mr. Beveridge: It's an interesting thing because the way they framed it was that it's inevitable that the ...
Life Is What You Make It.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ June 24, 2008 Dear Friends of Clay, It is said that people die the way they live. Knowing Clay as you do, you will probably not be surprised by the story I want to share with you. In the past week, as he approaches the final deadline of his life, ...
Is Syms Stitching Big Deal Downtown?
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Syms is an eerily quiet department store housed in an ugly white building that crouches low on Trinity Place. Most of its windows are bricked up. Its outlandishly nice staff, "educators" in Syms parlance, tend to row after row of neatly hung blazers and pantsuits. ...
The High-End End?
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Luxury apartment prices dropped in Manhattan in the second quarter of 2008, and sales were down in the first six months of the year compared to the two six-month periods immediately before. The end of an era in Manhattan luxury? Not bloody likely. There are ...
Silver's Change of Heart on Bloomberg's Gansevoort Transfer Station.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Many people have thought for a long time that Michael Bloomberg's solid waste plan--which included opening a garbage transfer station near Gansevoort Street in the Meatpacking District--would never pass in Albany, given that three Assembly members from Manhattan ...
The Bruno Years.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ State Senator Joseph Bruno is an old-fashioned politician who never saw much reason to hide the power and influence he accumulated during the decades he represented parts of the Capital District. Senator Bruno was--is--a character out of a William Kennedy novel, a ...
The Big Man.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ "The secret of a magazine is passion." So said Clay Felker, a giant of journalism who died Tuesday morning in Manhattan at age 82. And the passion which most animated Clay was New York, the city he loved and understood so much that he founded a magazine by ...
Events for Wednesday, July 2, 2008.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ 9:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. State Senate Democratic Taskforce on Criminal Justice Reform holds public forum on preventing wrongful convictions in New York state; Malcolm X & Dr. Betty Shabazz Memorial & Educational Center, 3940 Broadway. 10 a.m. Groundbreaking on a ...
The New Parent Trap: Have a Fling!
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ "You shouldn't get too attached. Don't you want to date around? I was with so many people in my 20s." My parents have been nervous about my relationship with my Ivy League-educated, hardworking, literary-minded boyfriend from the beginning. They'd always ...
Yikes! Manhattan Men Bare Hairy Knees, Plump Calves.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ On a sweltering afternoon early last month, Adam Newman, a 25-year-old Park Slope comedian who works for CollegeHumor.com, made a life-changing decision: He took scissors to a pair of brown corduroy pants and fashioned them into shorts. "It's getting hot ...
Ladies Retort With--Good Lord!--a $990 Cocktail Short.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ It used to be that if a grown woman were wearing shorts, it would be for purely utilitarian, counter-style moments: jogging, errands on a hot Saturday, a trip to the Laundromat. That is no longer the case. There is the return of the '60s high-waisted hot ...
The Books of Summer.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Racy Rushdie Want to feel uncomfortable? The Enchantress of Florence (Random House, $26, in stores) inspired the L.A. Times to "wonder how Salman Rushdie's literary fortunes would have fared without the infamous fatwa." Ouch! We can't decide if that's ...
You Don't Look Like This in Shorts.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[Yikes! Manhattan Men Bare Hairy Knees, Plump Calves By Joe Pompeo On a sweltering afternoon early last month, Adam Newman, a 25-year-old Park Slope comedian who works for CollegeHumor.com, made a life-changing decision: He took scissors to a pair of brown ...
Elsewhere: Obama and Progressives, Paterson and Skelos.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ A new CNN national poll shows Barack Obama with 50 percent of the vote, and John McCain with 45 percent. Colin Powell met with both Obama and McCain. Kos pulled back his donation to Obama, citing the senator's position on FISA, his snub of ...
Wes Clark Is Right.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Despite all the feigned outrage fanned by the mainstream media and the right-wing noisemakers, Wesley Clark--retired four-star general, former Supreme Commander of NATO, wounded and highly decorated veteran of ground combat in Vietnam, and a military man to his ...
Harry Winston Sells Flagship Store to Paramount For $62 M.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Ronald Winston, son of the founder of the eponymous Harry Winston jewelers, has sold the firm's flagship building at 718 Fifth Avenue for $62 million, according to city records. Paramount Group, which made the purchase, is apparently on a shopping spree ...
After Willets Point Community Vote, Landowners Claim Victory Too.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Following last night's late-night Queens Community Board 7 conditional endorsement of the city's redevelopment plan for Willets Point, the landowner and business group opposing the redevelopment there is hailing the vote as a victory. The margin of support, ...
Cuomo: 'Grasso Case Is Over'.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Andrew Cuomo announced he won't appeal the court's decision to side with Dick Grasso, further eroding Spitzer's legacy as attorney general. Here's the statement: "We have reviewed the Court's opinion and ...
Lady Selling $47.5 M. Co-op: 'What Difference Does It Make To Me? None! Zero!'.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ In tomorrow's Manhattan Transfers, I write about a seven-bedroom duplex (actually, a "gym/bedroom" makes it eight) that went on the market this month at 1030 Fifth Avenue for $47.5 million, one of the biggest apartment listings ever in New York. (See ...
Citing Visa Problems, Boy George Cancels Concert for City's Sanitation.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ This morning Boy George announced that he's canceling his tour and will not be able to perform for New York City's Department of Sanitation workers as he had planned. Last week his managers said that the singer was denied a visa to the States because he ...
In the Heights Choreographer Guesting on So You Think You Can Dance.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Andy Blankenbuehler, the dance choreographer who won a Tony award for his saucy Latin and contemporary routines for Broadway's In the Heights, will be a guest on the best (in our humble opinion!) reality show on network TV this summer: Fox's So You Think You Can Dance ....
'Exclusive' Hamptons Networking Site Open to All.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Hamptons-vacationing New Yorkers have been getting emails in their inboxes inviting them to join a website called Hamptons Undercover. According to the site, it is "an exclusive social networking website for jet-setters who summer in or visit the Hamptons." ...
Kuhl's Mailer, Baldwin's Threat.(Website overview)
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The Log Cabin Republicans repudiated John McCain on same-sex marriage. [Ben] David Yassky's comptroller campaign has a new web site. [David Yassky] A blogger deconstructs Representative Randy Kuhl's energy mailer, in which he pushes a bill that ...
Obama's Separation of Church and State.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ The speech Barack Obama gave today on the role of faith-based initiatives in his administration is bound to win over some of the Christian voters the campaign thinks it can poach from the Republican Party. It may also irritate some of his socially liberal ...
Rock 'n' Roll History.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ ARK OF THE LIBERTIES: AMERICA AND THE WORLD By Ted Widmer Hill and Wang, 355 pages, $25 Ted Widmer has carved out the kind of heroically peripatetic career in entertainment, politics and scholarship that gives young men hope and older ...
Weiner Won't Be a 'Press Critic'.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Anthony Weiner said in a recent interview that the public hasn't noticed Michael Bloomberg's failure to push the city's agenda in Albany because the mayor has "had a lapdog press corps." The Congressman, of course, may have to deal with that press corps if ...
Wednesday, July 16th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Liam Neeson in the flesh? We'll take two, please! The blue-eyed Paddy performs Beckett's Eh Joe, one of three short one-man Beckett works in Lincoln Center Gate/Beckett Festival, imported for our theatrical stimulation from the Gate Theater of Dublin. (Ralph Fiennes ...
Tuesday, July 15th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Just when you thought television couldn't get any better than Celebrity Circus, here comes CBS's Greatest American Dog. One of the judges, Wendy Diamond, editor and founder of Animal Fair Magazine (Ms. Diamond, can we have your life?), is hosting the Paws for Style ...
Monday, July 14th.(Theater review)
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Quatorze juillet! Merde! C'est Bastille Day! French folks in New York go a little crazy today, so keep your kids at home, folks. If you must brave our frog-filled streets, head to the Garden, where our favorite Brit who doesn't have the name Peter O'Toole, the ...
Sunday, July 13th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ You know you've got buckets of cash if you're having dinner Sunday night in the Hamptons. (Well, either that or you're unemployed, don't have to be anywhere Monday morning, and you're sleeping in your car and eating Dinty Moore from the can.) Nick & Toni's celebrates ...
Rapfogel's Salary.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Recently, I wrote about the (legal and normal) process by which some politically connected nonprofits continue to get a good deal of money in City Council-distributed member items. In the comments section on that post, a vigorous discussion ensued about the ...
Friday, July 11th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Back before the Hamptons became a Hummer-dinger of a society traffic jam, the annual Artists and Writers Softball Game in August had a pale-flabby-flailing charm. (You haven't lived until you've seen Mort Zuckerman dig one out of the dirt.) Well, it's still got The ...
Saturday, July 12th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Today while you're using an old toothbrush to try to clean the nooks and crannies on your stove, people wearing linen and "face powder" will be beating the heat at the Parrish Art Museum in Southampton's Midsummer Party, gorging on Glorious Food in lavishly decorated ...
Wednesday, July 9th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Feist--the women your boyfriend keeps comparing you to silently in his head while you're asleep--performs at the Prospect Park Bandshell to flocks of nubile female fans and the occasional dude, and Jennifer Aniston's unlikely lover, musician and failed comedian John ...
Thursday, July 10th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ High-schoolers from Long Island sneak out of second-floor suburban bedrooms--ker-PLUNK!--and buy 40s with fake IDs before heading to Radio City Music Hall on the LIRR to see the Steve Miller Band (we know this because we were once a high-schooler from Long Island) ....
Tuesday, July 8th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Lacking a married older man with whom to retire to the Hamptons for long weekends? Take a "guyatus" (their word, not ours; rhymes with hiatus) and head to NoLita literature mecca (an oxymoron, you'd think!) McNally Robinson to fete The DailyCandy Lexicon: Words That ...
Sunday, July 6th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ We're going out on a limb and predicting a Wimbledon men's final between Anna Wintour pet Roger Federer and Mallorcan conquistador punk Rafael Nadal (who's pretty hot from certain camera angles, albeit a bit young for us.) Machinelike Federer may finally be ...
Monday, July 7th.
Jul 01, 2008 ... <![CDATA[ Don't you have a fancy benefit or ball to attend tonight? No? Then drag your ambiguously gay boyfriend to Williamsburg for the re-launch of Monday Night Burlesque at the Art Space Formerly Known as Galapagos (unpronounceable symbol forthcoming), which has decamped down ...