As in, come for the bellinis, stay for the $18.95 bowl of minestrone*:

A Cipriani restaurant without a liquor license: aphorisms about dogs without bones spring to mind. How could it go on? And would it even be possible?

On Wednesday, the State Liquor Authority charged several affiliated Manhattan restaurants run by Giuseppe Cipriani and his father, Arrigo, with multiple violations of state laws, and threatened the maximum penalty: revocation of their liquor licenses.

Interviews with people in the restaurant business on Friday suggest that it would not be easy or even practical for the Ciprianis to continue to operate as a dry minichain, but that resourcefulness might go a long way. “They should look at it as an opportunity to get creative,” said Karine Bakhoum, a restaurant publicist.

The Ciprianis run the Rainbow Room, Harry Cipriani and several other restaurants and catering halls in Manhattan. The famous Harry’s Bar in Venice, opened in 1931 by Arrigo Cipriani’s father, is the flagship property of the empire. Ernest Hemingway was its best-known patron, and the bellini — Champagne with peach purée, juice or schnapps — its primary contribution to civilization.

Ms. Bakhoum said that in 2006, she represented Novo, a restaurant that had just opened on Hudson Street before being granted its liquor license. “It had a wonderful Latino menu, so we did a campaign with a water bar and fresh juices,” she said. “You could design your own water, with fruits and extracts. We made it a differentiation point rather than a detraction point. We found that many people weren’t interested in drinking alcohol because of the caloric content.”

Still, restaurateurs say that alcohol sales can account for more than half their revenue — with much higher profit margins than from food sales. The Cipriani chain’s logo depicts a bartender mixing drinks. Can you imagine a bellini built on fortified water?

Another point of inspiration might be called the Club Kalua strategy. Club Kalua is the nightspot in Queens where Sean Bell was shot to death by police officers in November 2006. The subsequent loss of the club’s liquor license became an opportunity to unburden the dancers of bikini tops, and it became a topless club (serving virgin passion-fruit mojitos and Red Bull cocktails).

“You lose a lot of business,” said Roger Duran, Club Kalua’s owner. Still, he said, “It’s working very well for me at the moment.” The patrons who stayed? “They go for the girls, basically.”

*Or the much vaunted $36.95 lasagna:

Over the years the Cipriani restaurant family and its employees have faced charges of sexual harassment, insurance fraud and tax evasion, the last leading to guilty pleas by two family members in July.

But the crime that comes to mind first when I think of the Ciprianis is highway robbery. Based on my recent experience, that’s what happens almost any time Harry Cipriani on Fifth Avenue serves lunch or dinner.

(Perhaps) driving your taxpayer-funded car, you get pulled over for drunk driving, only to be bailed out by your Baby Mama, subsequently exposing a secret double life:

Rep. Vito Fossella today admitted he fathered a love child in a longtime secret affair with the woman who rescued him from the drunk tank.

Fossella, who is married and has three children in New York, did not say if he would step down or seek re-election.

“I have had a relationship with Laura Fay, with whom I have a 3-year-old daughter,” Fossella said in a four paragraph statement.

“My personal failings and imperfections have caused enormous pain to the people I love and I am truly sorry.

“While I understand that there will be many questions, including those about my political future, making any political decisions right now are furthest from my mind.

“Over the coming weeks and months, I will to continue to do my job and I will work hard to heal the deep wounds I have caused.”

His relationship with retired Col. Laura Fay came to light after cops busted him for drunken driving in Arlington, Va., just after midnight on Thursday May 1. He was released to Fay’s custody seven hours later.

Fossella, who smelled of alcohol and had wine-stained lips, told a cop that he was going to the home of his sick daughter on Grimm St. about three miles away, records show.

Law firms forced to slum it in Brooklyn:

The Atlantic Yards project may be falling apart on Bruce Ratner, but the developer released some big news for his Metrotech office complex Downtown: the Manhattan law firm of Weil, Gotshal is moving to Brooklyn.

Forest City Ratner Vice President Mary Anne Gilmartin made the announcement at the Brooklyn Real Estate Roundtable on Tuesday that the 500-lawyer white shoe firm would soon relocate to Metrotech.

“It’s a paragon shift from back-office to more-discerning tenants,” she said.

Update . . .

Highlighting the importance of keeping up appearances (as in, the economy actually grew 0.6 percent last quarter so we’re doing very well, thank you very much), the law firm denies the horrible accusation:

The Atlantic Yards project may be falling apart on Bruce Ratner, but the developer released some big news for his Metrotech office complex Downtown: the Manhattan law firm of Weil, Gotshal is moving part of its office to Brooklyn.

Forest City Ratner Vice President Mary Anne Gilmartin made the announcement at the Brooklyn Real Estate Roundtable on Tuesday, but said that the 500-lawyer white shoe firm would soon relocate to Metrotech. That turned out to be untrue, as a press release from the company said only some back-office staffers would relocate to 15 Metrotech, which is on the office complex’s commons, between Myrtle Avenue and Tech Place.

[Gersh, you're killing me, buddy -- here I am ready to sit down with a tall glass of scotch and then . . .]

Here we were led to believe that people in London loved congestion pricing. Or not:

At the polling station in St Peter’s Church, Eaton Square, Belgravia, central London, the congestion charge appeared to be the key factor in deciding which box voters will choose for their cross.

Louise Petano, 29, a mother of one, said she wanted Conservative Boris Johnson to win but thought the result would be too close to call.

“Congestion charge is the main factor that I am voting on today. This is going to affect young families like mine.

“People didn’t care as much about it at the last election, but the bureaucracy and political changes the mayor has brought into place since then has been far greater than before. All the people I know who can vote, are all coming out this time.”

. . .

At Walnut Tree Walk primary school in Kennington, south London, shop assistant Mary Hickey, 58, had just voted Conservative.

She said: “Last time I voted for Ken Livingstone but I can’t do it again. I think Boris is going to win. Mine wasn’t a vote for the Conservatives; I genuinely think Boris is a better man for the job. I don’t like the congestion charge and I don’t like the people he associated with abroad.”

Sonia Calheiros, 31, an administrator said she also voted for Johnson because the situation in London was “getting worse.” She said: “It’s getting harder to lead a decent life in London. Everything is so expensive, housing, public transport, congestion charge, and Ken Livingstone does nothing to help.”

Adnan Yildiz, 58, a hotel caterer, said: “I voted for Ken twice before, I have been in the unions for 40 years but I have just voted for Boris Johnson. It felt very strange ticking the Conservative box.

“I feel like Ken has taken away my freedom with the congestion charge. It hasn’t solved the traffic problem and is only hurting the poor because the rich can afford to pay no matter what it is.

“He is wasting so much money, there was the American transport commissioner who did nothing, and there’s all the foreign trips that he makes to India and South America.”

Not the last word? Hmm . . .

Economy down, negativism up:

Waterfront projects — some real, some imagined — were the highlight of yesterday’s Staten Island Economic Development Corp. exhibition and conference at the Hilton Garden Inn, where there was talk about building 1,000 units of housing and an IMAX theater next to the St. George Ferry terminal and an outlet mall on the South Shore waterfront.

But what Staten Island is most likely to get by year’s end is a $35 million cement terminal next to the Bayonne Bridge in Elm Park and a small business park on Richmond Terrace in Port Richmond. Both are expected to break ground within the next few months.

Sure he’s a traitor, blah blah, but there’s also something really, really funny about it:

The man who tried to curse the Yankees by burying a Red Sox jersey in the Bombers’ new stadium lives just a short drive from the House that Ruth Built.

The culprit is a mason — born and raised in the Country Club section of southeast Bronx.

“As I stuck it in, I said, ‘The Yankees are done for the next 30 years.’ I only put a 30-year curse because I’m 46 and in 30 years I’ll be dead, and I won’t care if the Yankees win then,” said “Gino,” who spoke from a construction job in Manhattan.

Already, the man’s co-workers defaced his station wagon with Yankee slogans written in shoe polish.

Long a Yankee hater, the turncoat hatched his plan last August after refusing to set foot on the job out of spite.

One summer day, he placed a carefully folded jersey bearing the name and uniform number of David Ortiz, the slugging Red Sox designated hitter known as Big Papi, into the concrete mix being laid along the third base line.

“The reason why is George Steinbrenner told [Yankees GM Brian] Cashman to get Ortiz and Cashman told him, we don’t need him, We have [Jason] Giambi and Nick Johnson,” Gino boasted, referring to a chance the Yanks had to sign Ortiz in 2003.

“Rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for All-State Insurance company to make more money,” he ranted. “Every ball thrown, I hope I have the last laugh. Red Sox Nation is alive and well.”

Two witnesses spotted the mason planting the shirt, which he wore to work that day, in the floor of the visitor’s locker room in front of the third-base line — not on the field.

But Gino was coy as to the exact location.

The Steinbrenners “don’t have enough money to [make me] tell you where it actually is,” he said.

The traitor said he’d been rooting for the Red Sox since the days of Jim Rice in the 1970s.

When he buried the jersey, this Benedict Arnold was making $88 an hour to do construction at the treasured site. And he documented the entire sabotage on his cellphone camera.

Is it perverse New-York-is-the-center-of-the-world braggadocio to say that Isiah Thomas’ Knicks are “Absolutely, Positively the Worst Team in the History of Professional Sports”? No, actually it seems about right:

When the venerable Donnie Walsh arrived on Wednesday as the Knicks’ fourth president in seven years, he supplanted the least-loved incumbent since LBJ. During the four years and change of the Isiah Thomas era, the team lost more than 60 percent of its games, a ratio that got worse after Thomas added the title of head coach in 2006. Over that span, the Knicks have amassed the largest payroll (peaking at more than $160 million with luxury tax) and the third-worst record in the National Basketball Association. Never has so much been spent for so little in the world of sports. They’ve been called the worst team in the history of pro basketball, but they’re really much worse than that. These Knicks are worse than the fire-sale ‘41 Phillies or the expansion ‘62 Mets or the ‘76 Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who were perfect in their winlessness. They’re the worst of the worst because of how they’ve lost, in petulance and complacency — and with management that bulldozed any critic it could not ignore.

. . .

Not surprisingly, the current edition leads the league in forced shots, blown assignments, sideline spats, mini-mutinies, and wholesale mockery. Old nemesis Reggie Miller, now on TNT, called the Knicks “a leaguewide joke.” The Phoenix Suns’ Leandro Barbosa was distraught when a prankster said they had traded for him. “My heart was hurting,” the Brazilian said. “I went a little crazy.”

. . .

The HMS Thomas was a loose ship. Practices went short, with scant focus on defense and off days galore. When Isiah got bored, he’d invite a special guest like boxer Roy Jones Jr. to join their drills or hang around the locker room. Perhaps the Knicks ran out of things to do, as their playbook was the slimmest in the league. “Scouts love going to see them because it’s an easy night,” the Eastern scout said. When in doubt, Thomas fell back on “isolation,” where Randolph or Crawford went one-on-one before chucking. This didn’t take much practice; the players had been doing it since they were 8 years old.

Many things to take away from the State Assembly refusing to vote on Mayor Bloomberg’s congestion pricing proposal, including . . .

Relief that Bloomberg is not running for president (or hopefully vice president), since he seems to have no skill at dealing with a legislative branch:

“Mayor Bloomberg, after 6-1/2 years in office, still doesn’t have the relationships and the understanding of how to approach this body,” said Assemblyman Michael Kellner (D-Manhattan), a congestion-pricing supporter. “If he had talked to influence-makers and members directly early on, it could have made a difference.”

Also, that people may be starting to resent the condescending Goldman Sachs-type of politician:

This time, however, Silver appeared to favor Bloomberg’s plan, personally, but chose to defer to an overwhelming number of fellow Democrats who . . . [f]elt Bloomberg was too heavy-handed in trying to sell his plan with a variety of behind-the-scenes carrots and sticks. As one Assembly Democrat put it, “The mayor, with his money and power, could roll the [city] Council but he couldn’t roll the Assembly.”

See also:

Last week, with a landmark proposal at a delicate juncture, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s transportation commissioner raced to Albany as part of an all-out effort to persuade state lawmakers to approve a measure to charge drivers entering the busiest sections of Manhattan.

In Albany, the commissioner, Janette Sadik-Khan, expressed the mayor’s sentiments, saying: “You are either for this historic change in New York or you’re against it. And if you’re against it, you’re going to have a lot of explaining to do.”

Ms. Sadik-Khan’s remarks were widely noted by Albany lawmakers, with some viewing her tone as condescending. So when it was revealed that the state police had pulled her over for speeding and improperly using her lights and sirens on her way to the Capitol, it only underscored what the legislators saw as the Bloomberg administration’s imperious attitude.

“When Commissioner Sadik-Khan was coming up here telling me I can’t drive, she was busy being driven in a city-owned car by a chauffeur, speeding, getting a ticket with her lights and sirens on,” said Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, a Bronx Democrat and an ardent foe of the program. The proposal was “rotten to the core,” said Mr. Dinowitz, who was handing out copies of a Daily News article about Ms. Sadik-Khan’s citations to fellow legislators.

. . .

Indeed, several lawmakers, already offended by what they saw as the mayor’s past highhandedness, said that the hardball tactics employed by Mr. Bloomberg and his surrogates simply made a bad situation worse. In recent weeks, for instance, the League of Conservation Voters announced the creation of a political action committee positioned to work against lawmakers who did not support the plan.

Mr. Bloomberg is close to the organization, and Kevin Sheekey, his chief political deputy, spoke at a party celebrating the establishment of the committee, called the Climate Action PAC. Both men have hinted that opponents of congestion pricing would face rejection by voters in the fall elections.

“If there are people out there who aren’t helping New York City, I suppose they should fear,” Mr. Sheekey said on Monday, just hours before the Assembly rejected the measure in a closed door meeting. “It’s not the mayor they should worry about.”

But the threatening tone did not sit well with state lawmakers. “I imagine that’s how one becomes a multibillionaire, by being a strong-arm individual,” said Assemblyman J. Gary Pretlow, a Westchester Democrat who opposed the plan. “He’s not going to push us around, though. We are the immovable body at this point.”

And, noting that unmitigated bullshit doesn’t get you anywhere, I wonder if people actually even believe this:

Yet yesterday’s real loser is the MTA, which stood to receive the toll revenue and will now likely face leaner times ahead.

Even with congestion pricing, the MTA had a $9.5 billion hole in its five-year capital plan. Bonds backed by the fee would have provided $4.5 billion, while another $4 billion in bonds would be supported by new state funding and a local match.

“My math is they now have a $17.5 billion hole in a $29.5 billion plan,” said rider advocate Gene Russianoff of the Straphangers Campaign. “It’s more hole than it is program.”

An MTA statement expressed disappointment, but said, “We will work with our funding partners to find the billions needed.”

In other words, why don’t you try not spending half a billion on hand scanners or three or four times that on a subway to a vacant lot?

Then there’s this:

New York may have lost $354 million in federal funds yesterday, but U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters has already been looking for greener pastures. Last Friday, she suggested that Seattle consider congestion pricing.

Should play well there! Suckers!

Somebody ask Fidler! Because the plan is dead:

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s ambitious dream to remake New York City streets with an elaborate plan for congestion pricing died today in a private conference room on the third floor of the State Capitol.

It was there that Democratic members of the State Assembly, who control the chamber, held one final meeting to debate the merits of Mr. Bloomberg’s plan, ultimately voting — in secret — against the idea. The opposition was so overwhelming, said Sheldon Silver, the Assembly speaker, that he would not hold an open vote of the full Assembly, though many Republicans were supportive of Mr. Bloomberg.

“The congestion pricing bill did not have anywhere near a majority of the Democratic conference, and will not be on the floor of the Assembly,” Mr. Silver said after his meeting with fellow Democrats.

. . .

“The word ‘elitist’ came up a number of times,” said Assemblyman Mark S. Weprin, a Queens Democrat, who said his constituents overwhelmingly opposed the measure. “The members who oppose it did so because their constituents opposed it,” Mr. Weprin said. He estimated that opinion among Assembly Democrats ran four to one against the plan.

. . . so don’t goof with the skullcap, cheese:

Uria Ohana, 25, a member of the Chabad Lubavitch movement, told The Post he entered a subway station alone at Fourth Avenue and Ninth Street in Park Slope at 6:20 p.m. Tuesday.

Ohana said he went through a turnstile and spotted a group of young Arabic men sitting on a bench.

“I wasn’t afraid of anything. I didn’t think anything would happen,” he said.

But something did.

Ohana said he felt a hand grab his brown yarmulke off his head.

He then spun around and came face to face with one of the men, Ali Hussein, 18, police said.

“There were no words exchanged. I decided to chase him to get my yarmulke back,” Ohana said.

Hussein’s friends joined in the foot pursuit, screaming “Allah-hu Akbar,” which means “God is great.”

They ran outside and Hussein darted into the street, where he was hit by a blue Volvo and toppled to the ground, cops said.

“He couldn’t move. He broke his leg. He was crying,” said Ohana.

The idea that this is somehow better only makes it seem worse:

Sifting for clues in the wreckage of Eliot Spitzer’s stunning, sordid prostitution scandal — and trying to make sense of what no doubt will always contain a large element of pure insanity — that old mob investigation offers a vivid glimpse into the suddenly ex-governor’s psyche. “I don’t think [the prostitutes] were so much about the sex,” says one man who worked closely with Spitzer for many years and thought he knew him well. “There’s definitely an element of self-destruction. There’s complete ‘the rules don’t apply to me’; it’s very arrogant. But Eliot loves covert ops. He always has. The most animated or excited he ever gets is when he talks about running the sting on the Gambino family.”

Like the smarmiest teenager, America loves a hypocrite:

According to a law enforcement source close to the investigation, the Democratic governor used the alias “George Fox” when meeting with a prostitute. His alleged conversations with the prostitution ring are detailed in court papers in which Spitzer is identified as “Client 9,” according to a source.

You mean “George Fox” like the Quaker? God, what an asshole.

And did Elliot Spitzer take a prostitute across state lines, in violation of the anti-”white slavery” Mann Act? Kind of a tough one to try to explain:

The wiretap recording, made during an investigation of a prostitution ring called Emperors Club VIP, captured a man identified as Client 9 on a telephone call confirming plans to have a woman travel from New York to Washington, where he had reserved a room. The person briefed on the case identified Mr. Spitzer as Client 9.

Oh no. It may actually come to pass now that Spitzer finds himself on the wrong side of a press conference about a prostitution ring:

Mr. Spitzer, a first-term Democrat who pledged to bring ethics reform and end the often seamy ways of Albany, is married with three children.

And narsty Hep A:

Madonna and Ashton Kutcher are among the more than 700 patrons of the ultra-hip bar Socialista who are being urged by heath officials to get vaccinated for Hepatitis A after a bartender was discovered to be carrying the infection.

The barkeep, who recently returned from a South American vacation, was likely putting limes in mojitos and preparing other garnishes with bare hands — a not-uncommon shortcut of Health Code protocol in New York’s night spots. But the Health Department found another violation when they inspected Socialista this week: no soap for hand washing.

Hepatitis A is spread by putting something in one’s mouth that has been contaminated with traces of fecal matter from an infected person. Health officials issued a warning Thursday, asking anyone who visited the bar on Feb. 7, 8 or 11 to get a vaccination as a precaution. No additional cases of illness have been identified.

Socialista is the epitome of exclusivity: There’s a $600 minimum to sit down at one of its tables. Former Bungalow 8 doorman Armin Amiri spent an estimated $2 million to open the 1940s-Cuba-flavored West Village Café last May with a group of investors led by Giuseppe Cipriani and Sting’s wife, Trudie Styler.

I’m guessing the “empirical” doesn’t include the fact that Bloomberg’s final remaining positive attribute — a meaningless nod to “nonpartisanship”* — has been overtaken by events, specifically McCain’s meaningless nod to “nonpartisanship” and Obama’s meaningless nod to “nonpartisanship”:

A venture capitalist who founded a company expressly to support a presidential run by Mayor Bloomberg, and who is conducting nationwide voter analysis for the mayor, says his data show that Mr. Bloomberg can win the White House.

James Robinson IV, the founder of the technology and data analysis company Symposia Group, told The New York Sun he believes that “empirically, he can win,” even with the emergence of Senator McCain as the Republican front-runner.

After starting the company in December 2006, Mr. Robinson’s team, which he says includes people at the “top of the game” in search intelligence and database analysis, spent more than nine months building a technology system that attempts to gauge the thinking of Americans on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood, and even house-by-house, basis.

. . .

Mr. Bloomberg says repeatedly that he is “not a candidate,” but his high-profile appearances and speeches indicate he is trying to keep his options open. He did, however, deviate from his standard denial yesterday, when speaking to employees of Google at the company’s offices in the city.

After saying that he’s not a candidate for president, he went further than usual, adding that he’ll “stay that way.”

His subtle change in tone may be linked to Mr. McCain’s surge, which some political observers say makes it less likely Mr. Bloomberg will run.

Scott Rasmussen, the president of Rasmussen Reports, which conducts presidential polls, said he is fairly confident Mr. McCain will be the Republican nominee and that if Mr. Bloomberg is taking a serious look at the field right now, “he is seeing the door closing.”

. . .

Mr. Bloomberg’s possible presidential aspirations appeared to take a hit yesterday when Governor Schwarzenegger endorsed Mr. McCain for president. The California governor had said previously that he would not back a candidate in the race, leading some political observers to speculate that he was holding out to see if Mr. Bloomberg jumped into the fray.

Both advocate a nonpartisan, pragmatic approach to government, and Mr. Schwarzenegger has called Mr. Bloomberg his “soulmate.”

*And if you want to start talking about the Mayor’s nonpartisan legacy, examine the record.

One thing you want to avoid if you’re running for president is negative polling showing you would lose handily in virtually any head-to-head hypothetical matchup:

Mayor Bloomberg would lose the presidential vote in key states and even in New York City were he to run, according to a SurveyUSA poll commissioned by WABC. Despite his strong approval ratings in the city — currently 73% according to Quinnipiac University — Mr. Bloomberg would be able to claim, in his best scenario, 28% of the vote in a three-way race between Senator Obama and Michael Huckabee, losing easily to Mr. Obama. He fares even worse in other hypothetical match-ups, securing only 18% of the vote against fellow New Yorkers, Senator Clinton and Mayor Giuliani, and 21% against Ms. Clinton and Senator McCain.

Mr. Bloomberg faces hurdles in key states as well, maxing out at 16% of the vote in neighboring Pennsylvania, according to the poll. In California, which has more electoral votes than any other state and would likely be critical to a presidential victory, he does no better than 12%. The survey finds that one in four national voters do not know who Mr. Bloomberg is, and that only 11% have a favorable impression. No more than 13% say they would vote for him in a presidential election.

One thing you want to avoid if you’re running for president is raising taxes in an election year:

The robust growth in real estate values in New York, a trend that helped fuel years of record budget surpluses and city spending, has nearly skidded to a halt, city officials said Tuesday, and that shift could bring new pressure on Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to raise taxes.

The city estimates that when it conducts its annual valuation of all property in the city in May, it will be just 1.44 percent more than the last assessment, the smallest gain since the beginning of the Bloomberg administration.

In recent years, the city seemed insulated from dips in the national real estate market, posting several double-digit gains, including an 18 percent increase in values last year. But now, according to data from the tentative annual assessment roll, which will largely determine taxes for the fiscal year beginning in July, declining values of small homes outside Manhattan are pulling down the overall market as the effects of the country’s mortgage trouble take hold.

Precisely how the cooling market will affect revenues remains to be seen, but the data suggest that the kinds of surpluses that have allowed Mr. Bloomberg to increase spending on popular programs while saving for future costs are coming to an end. The city depends on property taxes for more than a third of its tax revenue and, given Wall Street’s woes, is already anticipating declines in income tax collections.

City budget officials declined to comment on the property numbers, but David I. Weprin, chairman of the City Council Finance Committee, said the lower assessments could lead to small increases in the tax rate or an end to the $400 property tax rebate given to homeowners for a property that is their primary residence.

“This is an indicator that we might be up for some tough fiscal times, and Wall Street isn’t helping, either,” he said. “Property values are no longer going up; they’ve stabilized, and I would expect that’s the trend we’ll see before they go down.”

George Sweeting, deputy director of the city’s Independent Budget Office, said the slowing real estate market would cost the city about $100 million in revenue, which could be made up by ending the property tax rebate, which would bring in $250 million in revenue. That change is likely to be politically unpopular.

The “galvanizing power” of a 7 train extension leads to . . . a renovated-but-no-more-expanded Javits Center:

Gov. Eliot Spitzer declared in a speech eight months ago that he would build a “thoroughbred” of a convention center in New York City and scrap the $1.8 billion plan he had inherited to expand the black-glass Javits Convention Center on the West Side.

Since then, state officials — struggling with escalating costs, competing demands and limited land — have had to shrink their ambitions, devising a series of alternative plans that provide a far more modest expansion than envisioned three years ago.

Now, in the latest blow to the governor’s ambitions, the city’s hotel association is balking at requests to triple the hotel tax earmarked for the expansion. That could force state and city officials to abandon plans for an expansion and settle instead for simply renovating the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.

The real-life art portrayed on the CW’s Gossip Girl is “a celebration of having lived on Staten Island,” according to the 60-year-old painter who created the works:

The swirling watercolors featured in the CW hit are the work of artist Rita Wilmers — a retired fashion designer who has quietly channeled her love of the arts into a second career from her home in Forest Hills, Queens.

One of Wilmers’ paintings, “Three of Hearts,” was the focus of an episode in October and it makes a reappearance in tonight’s episode, “Hi, Society,” in which boho mom and artist Alison Humphrey has an opening at her hipster husband Rufus’ Brooklyn art gallery.

“‘Three of Hearts’ marks the end of one part of my life — my 32 years on Staten Island — and the beginning of a new life in Forest Hills and a new [more abstract] art style,” Wilmers said. “It’s a celebration of having lived on Staten Island, saying goodbye, and moving on.”

HPD renders the Village Voice just that much more irrelevant:

In a crackdown on some of the worst landlords in New York City, housing officials have identified 200 of the most poorly maintained apartment buildings and are renewing efforts to force owners to repair hazardous conditions.

The Department of Housing Preservation and Development compiled a list of 200 buildings that have 27 or more of the most serious housing code violations and an average of five or more such violations per unit. The citations — for problems like minor leaks and hazardous conditions like lack of heat or hot water — were issued in the past two years, and the owners have either failed to correct the problems or failed to notify the city that they have.

The 200 properties are the first to be identified in the agency’s Alternative Enforcement Program, which was created this year under the new Safe Housing Law and is designed to put increased pressure on landlords to bring thousands of run-down buildings into compliance with the housing maintenance code.

The majority of the listed buildings — 132 — are in Brooklyn. The Bronx had the second most, 52. Many of the buildings are small residential properties, with fewer than 15 units. Visits to a handful of the buildings yesterday illustrated the bleak conditions facing many low-income families. Some tenants had broken stoves and could cook only on electric hot plates. Others lived with gaping holes in bathroom ceilings, mold on the walls, water leaks, faulty electrical connections and rats.

As good a reason as any not to act like a moron — the tongue-clucking Staten Island Advance:

A 29-year-old man from Richmond Valley with numerous speeding convictions died last night after he was thrown from his speeding car as it tumbled down the West Shore Expressway’s grassy median.

The crash victim, Michael P. Lehmann, of Culotta Lane, lived alone and he died alone.

If you’re enjoying watching hapless Mets fans suffer following the team’s unprecedented collapse, rest assured that there is a busy third day of coverage. First, the Times’ Murray Chass on what could have been:

This was supposed to be the game the Mets played, this afternoon’s game between Colorado and Philadelphia that begins this year’s postseason. But the Mets won’t be playing at Shea Stadium today. They have all scattered to their homes in various countries to dwell on their stunning collective failure and ponder their new place in baseball infamy.

Then there’s manager Willie Randolph’s cries for help:

In the roughly 40 hours that had elapsed since he left Shea Stadium on Sunday evening and returned yesterday morning, Willie Randolph had symbolically distanced himself from the Mets’ collapse. Randolph shaved his mustache, and his explanation — “Not a good time to be recognized in this town,” he said with a knowing smile — probably contained a kernel of truth.

His droll acknowledgment of the team’s failure to make the playoffs — a flop, he learned yesterday, that would not cost him his job as the team’s manager — offered a rare glimpse into a man whose public persona remained defiantly low-key and positive, even as the season was unraveling.

But yesterday Randolph opened up in a way that he seldom did during the season, conceding that the team may have been overconfident and acknowledging that his frustration has kept him awake at night.

“I’ve always been associated with winning, and it hurts deep down inside, really hurts, to be associated with this type of collapse,” Randolph said. “That’s not how we play the game, and there’s no way in the world that I thought we would be in this position right now talking about this; I thought we’d be preparing for the postseason. But it’s a cruel lesson in life and baseball. Make your bed and you live in it. We definitely set us up for this disappointment.”

. . .

“When the finality comes down, and you know that you didn’t reach your goal and you didn’t achieve what you wanted to achieve, it really tears you apart inside,” Randolph said. “Like I said, I’ve been there before, but this is probably the most pain I’ve felt since I’ve been in baseball.”

Not so bad, though, that he considered doing anything drastic. Asked again why he decided to shave his mustache, which will live on in the television footage and photographs chronicling the collapse, Randolph said, “I tried to cut my throat, but I aimed too high.”

And on top of all that, it’s revealed that reliever Scott Schoeneweis may be linked to Major League Baseball’s steroid scandal:

As Major League Baseball moves into the postseason, published reports linking players to performance-enhancing drugs continue to appear, creating a continued distraction for the sport and raising questions about whether the drug-testing program introduced in recent seasons is being outmaneuvered.

The latest report came Monday, when ESPN.com reported that Mets relief pitcher Scott Schoeneweis received six shipments of steroids in 2003 and 2004, when he played for the Chicago White Sox.

. . .

At Shea Stadium yesterday, Mets General Manager Omar Minaya said that the team had no knowledge of anything linking Schoeneweis to performance-enhancing substances when they signed him.

After a collapse so complete, so devastating, it’s understandable that you might start to question everything:

It wasn’t easy being a Mets fan yesterday, but it could not have been much harder on the fans than on those in hard hats building their laughingstock of a team a brand-spanking-new stadium in Flushing, Queens. In a city where the work can be hard and thankless, the combination of both was tough to beat here, backbreaking and heartbreaking all at once.

To hear Denis O’Neil, 36, an electrician, describe the mood at the construction site, one would think there had been a fatal on-the-job accident. “It’s just a somber day, you know?” he said. “There’s not really anything I could have done.”

But his feeling of helplessness quickly turned to anger. “What do you need a new stadium for?” he said, ignoring the fact that he was calling into question his own livelihood. “You can’t even win at the old stadium. What do you need a new one for?”

Location Scout: Citi Field.

The hubris of the Mets weighs heavily on those who are the least equipped to handle it:

Some cried at the end. Some laid blame. Some looked stunned and wretched. And the voices of Mets fans who had roared all summer for their no-bones champions were silent or subdued or outraged, with all bragging rights lost and grand dreams vanished on the last day of the season.

Around Shea Stadium as the stragglers filed out, on the Flushing trains bearing them away from the scene, in sports bars and homes where they had watched the debacle, Mets fans were a tragic lot: angry, betrayed, frustrated, baffled, crestfallen, as cheated and solemn as riders in a gallows cart.

. . .

The No. 7 train from Shea ran a bit slower into Manhattan, at least for the downtrodden in orange and blue. Little boys in Mets caps held the hands of fathers who had been crying. Couples rode silently, pensive and commiserating with head shakes and whispers.

But a man in a Mets jersey and salt-and-pepper hair shouted his disgust for all to hear. “I want an apology,” he demanded. “I want it in the newspaper, on TV and the radio.”

Dennis Higgins stormed off the train. “You want to know how I feel?” he asked a reporter. “I’m miserable, just miserable. I got hit with a double whammy. My girlfriend broke up with me last night, and then this.”

Katherine Hickey, a Mets follower for 40 years, said she watched distraught fans in the stands after the game. “Some people were crying,” she said. “They were in their seats with their heads in their hands, shaking. This is very difficult for all of us.”

After the pasta and meatballs dishes had been cleared from the dinner table, late afternoon at the Yonkers home of Carmela Olley, a 56-year-old widow and a Met fan for 30 years, was funereal. “It was like somebody died,” she said. “My nephew Joey kept repeating, ‘I’m so sorry, Aunt Carmela.’ My sister Theresa knows what this means to me every year, to watch and hope for the Mets.”

In Great Neck, Lenore Belzer, who grew up in Brooklyn in the 1950s, said she watched the Mets game alone, and was somehow reminded of the bygone Dodgers. “It was like reliving the past with the Dodgers,” she said. “And now I’m sick again.”

For Mets fans, the day began like a metaphor for New York itself — with confidence, hope and an armored determination. But after the first inning, with the Mets losing 7 to 1, most could glimpse the end like a distant dark cloud.

And let the recriminations begin . . . Billy Wagner in New York Magazine:

“We’ve been throwing four innings a night — for months!” he says. “Our pitching coach [Rick Peterson] has no experience talking to a bullpen. He can help you mechanically, but he can’t tell you the emotions. He has no idea what it feels like. And neither does Willie [Randolph]. They’re not a lot of help, put it that way.”

Staten Island psychics conclude that the Mets are toast:

“It ain’t over till it’s over,” Yogi Berra famously quipped, but for one Staten Island psychic, it’s over even before it ain’t.

“They’re not going to come close to winning whatsoever,” seer Jim Weiss said yesterday. “I just don’t get a good feeling about this team.”

Zillions of pundits and fans have been getting bad vibes from this New York nine since they started tanking last month, and you don’t need a sixth sense to read the stats.

The Mets lost a comfortable seven-game lead over the Phillies and now stand a game behind after last night’s 7-4 loss.

Looking ahead to this tense weekend of baseball, which will likely decide whether the Mets will make the playoffs, the Advance consulted with Weiss in his Prince’s Bay office:

“I hope I’m wrong, but I wrote them off back in June,” he said. “It’s as if they’re out of step. They’re not coordinated as a team.”

. . .

Astrologer Tanya Milton of St. George said it would take several days’ work to run star charts for the bombing bullpen — five days for the whole team. But she did perform a tarot card reading for slumping shortstop Jose Reyes, using his date of birth to predict his fate:

“I’m sensing that he’s feeling very insecure about his fans, and that might put him in a tilt,” she said. “If he could block out negative energy and focus on the game, he will prove himself and it will be a good [series]. Geminis depend a lot on the approval of others. Their egos need to be stroked.”

A pre-9/11 take on the Mets’ ineptitude:

As mortified fans watch the Mets fritter away their once-commanding grip on first place in the National League East, dread infects the city that it might be witnessing a collapse of unprecedented proportions. Even those who far prefer the Yankees can’t escape the fact that such a nose dive would be downright humiliating to New York.

How could they? How dare they?

John Glendinning, 53, a retired laborer from Brooklyn who goes by Whitey, is so agitated he can’t watch the games without losing his sense of civility. “I get too nervous,” he said. “I start throwing things at the wall.”

But, hey, calm down. Collapses happen.

Indeed, where would the city be without its grandiose collapses? The all-out falls from grace or riches or first place, or even a simple upright position, are a familiar and infuriating and perhaps even necessary part of the New York experience. And while collapses smart, they can also be spellbinding.

These breakdowns, of course, aren’t confined to baseball teams that suddenly forget how to hit or pitch, not to mention catch fly balls. They materialize in every aspect of life.

Roads collapse, stores collapse, financial markets collapse, egos collapse. They’ve all happened throughout New York’s history, again and again. During the 1975 fiscal crisis, in fact, the entire city just about collapsed.

Collapses can be aberrant or telling. They can reveal something about larger societal verities. Or they can be vacant of meaning — simply perversely breathtaking to watch.

Part of what makes these sour episodes so intriguing is the velocity at which they can happen. Part of what makes them so frightening is that they can upend our world, even cause us to root for a different team. People and institutions that we thought we knew and trusted to always be there are — poof — gone just like that.

Then again, one of the worthwhile things about collapses is that they allow the often pleasing challenge of recovery, which isn’t always that hard.

. . .

Infrastructure Collapses are pretty common: Walls go, roads go, especially when no one takes care of them. Thus in May 2005, a 75-foot-high retaining wall collapsed onto the Henry Hudson Parkway in Upper Manhattan, burying parked cars in mounds of debris and dirt. The road, at least, held. Not so in 1973, when an 80-foot section of the West Side Highway fell onto West Street near Canal Street.

No one was seriously injured in these collapses, but many New Yorkers worry a lot about pieces of the city falling apart.

The prince, on the other hand, has to listen to a bunch of presentations about the shipping industry:

Fort Wadsworth had a taste of royalty yesterday when Denmark’s Crown Prince Frederik toured the Coast Guard’s Vessel Traffic Center to observe how New York and New Jersey’s heavy volume of cargo and passenger vessel traffic is coordinated safely.

The visit was part of a five-day tour called Creative Nation, during which Prince Frederik — joined by Danish government and business leaders — aims to showcase and promote Danish business in the United States.

The prince, an officer in several branches of the Danish military, listened intently as Commander Ted Gangsei explained that Fort Wadsworth is home to the largest Coast Guard operational command center in the country.

. . .

Prince Frederik’s visit to the Big Apple is drawing major attention in Denmark, with several radio, television and print media representatives shadowing his every move here. Queen Margrethe, Prince Frederik’s mother, is the figurative head of state, and Prince Frederik is first in line for the throne.

Prince Frederik — who rang yesterday’s opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange — was scheduled to visit Danish companies with facilities in New York and New Jersey, as well as American businesses that use Danish products. He and his wife, Crown Princess Mary, and their 5-month-old daughter, Princess Isabella, are staying at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Manhattan.

If Bloomberg was going to run before (doubtful), he certainly won’t be able to now:

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has promoted himself as a model of fiscal restraint, issuing dire warnings about the slowing economy, recently asking agencies to limit hiring, and even listing “fiscal responsibility” as an interest on his MySpace page.

At the same time, a review of the city’s budget since 1980 shows that Mr. Bloomberg has been presiding over one of the greatest expansions of city government since the John V. Lindsay administration, fueled by an extraordinary surge in real estate revenues, both from higher property taxes and transfer taxes from sales.

Since Mr. Bloomberg took office in 2002, the city budget, adjusted for inflation, has swelled faster than it has under any other mayor during the last 27 years, increasing by 23 percent, to $60 billion.

By contrast, spending rose 8 percent during Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani’s eight years, and 4 percent under Mayor David N. Dinkins, who served one four-year term. Mr. Bloomberg’s spending also outpaced that of Mayor Edward I. Koch, who increased the budget by 19 percent over his last two terms.

After discovering a leftover cache of posionous gas in the United Nations I suppose this would be rather embarrassing:

When officials said that a potentially deadly chemical from Iraq had been found last month in a Midtown United Nations office, many questions followed. How did the sample get here? How did it get misplaced? And how could it sit in a box, unnoticed, for more than a decade at a world agency in the middle of New York?

But now, heaping embarrassment upon embarrassment, it appears that the chemical was merely a commercial solvent, a law enforcement official said.

Initially, officials said the substance was phosgene, an old-generation nerve-gas component used extensively at the end of World War I, and in Iraqi attacks against Kurds in the 1980s.

“We learned later,” said the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case, “that initial tests indicated it might be some kind of over-the-counter solvent, though we don’t know what kind.”

The sample, sealed in a container inside a plastic bag, which itself was inside a metal box, was reported to the State Department late last Wednesday and to other federal authorities on Thursday. It was discovered on Aug. 24 in an office of the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission at East 48th Street, which was shutting down. Workers happened upon it while clearing out filing cabinets and boxes, said Ewen Buchanan, a spokesman for the agency.