The War on Traffic may soon replace The War on Drugs as the most fruitless battle ever waged:

“Everything that is being looked at is being looked at seriously,” said Marc V. Shaw, chairman of the Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission, at a meeting of the panel yesterday. “There are a lot of committed people on this issue that feel very strongly about it, and we’re taking all these things seriously.”

Yesterday’s meeting included presentations on a series of possible alternatives or additions to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s congestion pricing proposal, which calls for charging drivers $8 a day to bring their cars into Manhattan below 86th Street. The mayor has championed the plan as a way to reduce traffic and raise money for public transportation.

The commission was created by the State Legislature to come up with a plan by the end of next month on how best to achieve both those goals. Under the timetable set by lawmakers, the Legislature would take up the plan by the end of March.

One proposal could be nearly as controversial as the mayor’s congestion pricing plan: the establishment of a No Hail Zone in the area below 86th Street.

Under such a plan, yellow cabs could pick up people only at designated taxi stands. The stands, up to 1,200 of them, would be set up on each block in busy areas and every few blocks in other parts of the zone.

Taxis account for close to a third of the traffic — or vehicle miles traveled each day — in the area, according to a research report prepared for the commission. It is hard, however, to predict what impact the change would have on traffic. While taxi drivers would spend less time cruising in search of fares, some might drive greater distances to get to the busiest taxi stands, said Bruce Schaller, deputy commissioner for planning and sustainability at the city’s Department of Transportation.

And the attitudes of riders have to be taken into account, Mr. Schaller said. The image of an intrepid or even aggressive New Yorker, hand upraised and hollering for a cab to stop, is an iconic one for many people. Some riders might resist lining up in orderly queues, waiting their turns.

“It wouldn’t be New York without it,” said Ricardo Barajas, 22, a law student. He saw the proposal as an encroachment on New Yorkers’ freedom to stand on street corners of their choosing with their hands in the air. “I don’t want to be restricted,” he said.

. . . against billboards that speak:

Last week, at the corner of Prince and Mulberry Streets in NoLIta, a scene was playing out that would have gladdened the heart of any advertising buyer. Pedestrians were turning and gawking at a six-story tenement emblazoned with a giant billboard for “Paranormal State,” a new television series about ghosts on A & E.

But passers-by were not reacting to the billboard. Each of them was hearing an urgent, disembodied female voice whispering suggestive messages. “What’s that?” the voice hissed. “Who’s there? It’s not your imagination.”

The voices, which belong to A & E employees, were emanating from two large black speakers above the billboard, which contained a technology called directional audio. The speakers use ultrasound to produce a highly focused beam of sound, making people within their reach feel as if they are wearing headphones, listening to sounds intended for them and them alone.
. . .

This appears to be the first commercial use of such technology on a billboard.

Peter Swimm, a 27-year-old technical support worker at Pando, an Internet startup with offices nearby, was among those transfixed one morning last week. Clasping his shaggy, bearded head, Mr. Swimm peered up at the billboard through the falling snow. “It’s neat,” he said. “With terrifying implications, like all things that are neat.”

. . .

According to Guy Slattery, A & E’s senior vice president for marketing, no special approval from the city had been required for the sonic billboard. And Kate Lindquist, a spokeswoman for the Department of Buildings, confirmed that the city does not regulate sounds emitting from billboards. She added, however, that this particular billboard lacked the permit required for all city billboards.

New York has more lawyers than it knows what to do with:

Even with 91,000 practicing attorneys in the five boroughs last year, a new wave of lawyers is hitting the city, as a record number of law school students are taking and passing the state bar, according to data provided by the New York State Board of Law Examiners.

In July, 10,907 students sat for the bar — an increase of more than 20% since 2000 — and a record 70.6% of them passed the bar.

While many associates who graduated law school in 2006 are earning bonuses at the city’s most prestigious law firms, boosting salaries to an average of $205,000 a year, recruiters said the competition for the top talent belies that the vast majority of lawyers in New York are not guaranteed lucrative employment after law school.

“There is a glut of attorneys in New York, and there always will be,” the president of Hanover Legal Personnel Services, Jack Zaremski, said in an interview. The total number of lawyers in America is now about 1.14 million, according to the American Bar Association, and more than one in 10 live and work in New York State.

This way he will be better equipped to answer the tough questions at controversial ribbon cuttings or perhaps even in response to contentious City Council resolutions. Hizzoner’s presidential aspirations surge ahead:

A report that a foreign policy adviser in the Clinton administration who is a critic of the war in Iraq, Nancy Soderberg, is briefing Mayor Bloomberg about the war offers some indication of the foreign policy approach Mr. Bloomberg might take if he were to run for president.

Ms. Soderberg is considered a centrist who supports using international institutions to further American interests abroad. In television appearances, she has spoken out about the war in Iraq, saying it has been botched from the beginning.

This sort of undercuts the Law & Order storyline:

In a stunning end to a sensational whodunit, Linda Stein’s assistant confessed she bashed in the Realtor’s head with a yoga stick after she blew pot smoke in her face and made a racial crack, police said Friday.

Natavia Lowery calmly cleaned up the Fifth Ave. penthouse after killing the “Realtor to the Stars” in a rage — then filched the dead woman’s cell phone and used her ATM card to steal $800, cops said.

Lowery, 26, was charged with second-degree murder in the baffling Oct. 30 slaying of Stein, a punk-rock pioneer who became wealthy by selling Manhattan’s best real estate to Madonna, Sting, Steven Spielberg and other celebs.

. . .

Hours earlier, with a videocamera rolling, Lowery confessed to cops, describing how her four months of employment as Stein’s go-fer came to a bloody end.

She said on the morning of Oct. 30 she got into an argument with the brash Stein, who co-managed the Ramones before she began selling penthouses to the rich and famous.

Stein, 62, who was battling cancer, started blowing pot smoke in her face and berating her as she worked on the computer, Lowery told cops.

“Get the f—ing e-mails! How can you be so f—ing slow!” Stein supposedly bellowed, a police source said.

Stein, who had private yoga sessions in her $2.5 million pad, was waving a 4-pound strength-building yoga stick at Lowery as she yelled, the assistant told cops.

After Lowery retrieved the e-mails, Stein offered to buy her lunch as a peace offering.

“I’ve got my own money. I don’t need you to buy me lunch,” the assistant said indignantly.

“Black people don’t have any money,” Stein retorted, according to Lowery. “Save your money and I’ll buy you lunch.”

An enraged Lowery grabbed the yoga stick from Stein and hit her with it a half-dozen times until she was face-down in a pool of blood, police said.

Because you know the (not $1 billion but $500 million) World Trade Center Sept. 11 memorial costs way to much money when the foundation funding it becomes one of the nation’s top nonprofits:

The World Trade Center Memorial Foundation has joined the annual honor roll of American nonprofits that received the most private support last year.

The organization, which raised $115 million in 2006, ranked no. 158 on a list of 400 entities compiled by the Chronicle of Philanthropy. The list is published in the Chronicle’s November 1 issue.

At the top of the list was United Way of America in Alexandria, Va., with $4.1 billion raised. No. 400 was the Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage, Calif., in the midst of a $200 million capital campaign, with $42 million raised.

The World Trade Center Memorial Foundation, which began operations in May 2005, in 2006 reported donations totaling $115 million. By June 1 of this year, it had raised $300 million of its $350 million goal for the building of a memorial and museum at the World Trade Center site. The fund-raising feat is impressive, as the foundation’s president quit in May 2006 after criticism for rising costs and delays. Mayor Bloomberg then stepped in as chairman of the foundation.

“It is a big deal that it raised enough money to get on the list,” the editor of the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Stacy Palmer, said of the new entrant from New York. “They put a lot of effort into bringing in a lot of very big gifts and saying, ‘We need to go ahead and move forward on this.’”

By way of contrast, the Staten Island Postcards memorial, a very nice memorial, only cost $2 million.

The experiment in legalization known as “dog runs,” those canine red-light districts, have in the long run failed. Today, dog owners feel more entitled than ever to appropriate valuable public space for the sole purpose of letting their animals poop:

Seravalli Playground is a half-block of concrete just off Hudson Street between Gansevoort and Horatio Streets, planted with a dozen skinny trees. For the most part, the playground is a model of coexistence. Older children race around the fenced-in yard, toddlers clamber around a brightly painted play set, and homeless people occasionally slumber on the benches. In the mornings and evenings, people walk their dogs.

But now the playground is due for a $2 million redesign, a prospect that has exposed sharp divisions among its users. In particular, dog owners who want a dog run in the playground have sparred with toddlers’ parents who say the dog run will take up needed play space and possibly endanger children. The Parks Department will draft a plan this winter and plans to start work next summer; in the meantime, both camps have been feverishly recruiting supporters.

Both sides showed up in force at a community meeting Monday, where the tone was set by a neon-green hand-lettered poster that read, “Keep Our Park Dog-Free.”

. . .

. . . [A] cluster of people, most of whom appeared to be in their 20s, had formed toward the front. Some wore buttons from an organization called the New York City Council of Dog Owner Groups (motto: “At the Tail of Every Leash is a Voter”).

Dog owners who spoke during the meeting complained that no dog runs were located nearby, and said that many other city parks combined dog runs with play areas.

“The reason we want this is to get out of your space,” said Tod Wohlfarth, a board member of the dog owners’ group. And a woman who said she owned three dogs announced to the assembled parents, “These animals are as important to my life as your children are to your life.”

Parents, in turn, spoke of children who were scared of dogs, children who compulsively embraced dogs, and toddlers who ate whatever they found on the ground, a potential problem if dogs were nearby. A local parent named Kevin McKiernan was greeted by wild applause when he said, “My kids are a higher priority to me than pets and their exercise.”

Because Hillary is so far to the left and Rudy is so far to the right you need exactly the right kind of candidate to thread the needle and sway the roughly eight people in the country who might actually give a poop that Bloomberg would run. And yet the New York Press gives him the full OJ treatment in “If He Did It”:

To all outward appearances, the Bloomberg plan seems to be running exactly according to schedule. Here’s what happens next.

According to several experienced campaign observers, Bloomberg has a few months to continue laying low, periodically bursting into the news and then issuing his presidential denials. He cannot be coy, and he cannot let the anticipation morph into expectation. There is much he can learn — though he probably does not need to be taught — from the experience of Fred Thompson, the former Tennessee senator and “Law & Order” district attorney, who toyed with the idea for so long that the story had already become stale by the time he declared.

Bloomberg and his advisers know something about marketing. If he does run and intends to win, he will need to sell himself as the fresh alternative. Products cannot be sold as new for 12 months. Bloomberg and those around him with their marketing expertise would understand this. Even if Bloomberg has definitively made up his mind to run — as many who have watched him closely believe he has — part of the way to win would be to keep things under wraps for now.

There’s something unnervingly unmanly about the idea that Alex Rodriguez gets pumped up by listening to Pat Benatar:

Alex Rodriguez’s choice of music in spring training was perfectly fitting for his personality. As he prepared for the season, he played the Pat Benatar song “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” over and over, at high volume, in his earphones. The message was purposeful, motivational . . . and just a little forced.

Knock me down, it’s all in vain, I’ll get right back on my feet again!

He warns people that we may see Hoovervilles return to Central Park:

Housing in Central Park?

It’s not out of the question if disaster strikes and the city finds itself desperate to find homes for thousands of displaced residents, Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday as he announced a design competition for long-term emergency shelter.

“Clearly, in an emergency, rather than let people sleep on the streets, you would do that,” the mayor said.

First museums, then cars, then the subway and now airplanes:

New Yorkers by next summer could be paying higher airfares and have access to fewer flights, as the Federal Aviation Administration says it is eyeing congestion pricing and a cap on flights arriving and departing from John F. Kennedy International Airport in an effort to reduce crippling airline delays.

Responding to a summer marked by the worst flight delays since the FAA started keeping records in 1995, President Bush said yesterday there is “a lot of anger amongst our citizens” about unreliable flight schedules.

Mr. Bush has asked his secretary of transportation, Mary Peters, to convene a task force of airline executives and officials from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to make recommendations on how to reduce air traffic delays at JFK and throughout the New York region. The group is to issue recommendations by the end of 2007.

Airlines could be charged steeper fees to land their planes during peak hours, which could work as an incentive to steer more flights into off-peak slots, Ms. Peters said. Airlines would be expected to pass on the extra costs to customers.

Exciting because it’s been a while since I’ve thought about “Kill it!”:

The federal government is suing Bloomberg L.P., the financial services and media giant founded by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, saying the company engaged in a pattern of discrimination against women after they became pregnant and took maternity leave.

In the suit, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission charges that female employees at Bloomberg were demoted and had their pay cut after they disclosed that they were pregnant.

In some cases, managers questioned the women’s ability to carry out their work because of their family responsibilities, according to the suit, which was filed in United States District Court in Manhattan yesterday.

. . .

The discrimination is said to have occurred after Mr. Bloomberg became mayor in 2002, and though he remains the majority shareholder of the firm, company officials stressed yesterday that he had not been involved in its day-to-day operations since early 2001.

The case could be damaging to the mayor, however, as he seeks to boost his national profile and flirts with a presidential bid. In a similar case, Mr. Bloomberg was sued in 1997 by a sales executive who claimed that after she became pregnant, Mr. Bloomberg urged her to have an abortion, telling her, “Kill it!” and saying sarcastically, “Great! Number 16,” apparently referring to the number of pregnant women at the company. Mr. Bloomberg adamantly denied any wrongdoing and settled the case out of court for an undisclosed amount.

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.

. . . you really are best seen and not heard:

“I have never had such a nice bathroom,” said Nastya Zhelkovskaya, a 17-year-old Russian fashion model who was in town for fashion week. In August 2006, the slender blonde was standing outside her school in Moscow when a modeling agent approached. Now she was giving The Observer a tour of her new, temporary digs — a two-bedroom, second-floor apartment on West Broadway and Prince Street which she was sharing with five other models. (Three Russians in one bedroom, two Brazilians in another bedroom, one Romanian in the living room.) It was one of the many so-called model apartments that crop up this time of year. “In my city, in my apartment, I don’t have such a bathroom,” she said.

. . .

So what goes on in this cramped little room in the wee small hours? Pillow fights? Endless boy talk?

“No, we don’t talk very much about boys, we have enough problem of our own,” she said.

Political discourse?

“No, we’re girls, we are not talking about politics,” she said. “Sometimes we talk about shows we have done. Every morning, we talk about what clothes to put on.”

Nastya recalled that on this morning, “Maria put on her jeans and a white shirt with a belt. Tanya, a black dress. And me, jeans and this gray shirt.”

“Actually, usually we don’t like each others’ outfits,” she added.

. . .

Nighttime activity centers around the Internet and telephone. They don’t have a TV. If Nastya is not surfing the Web, she’s chatting with friends on instant messenger or talking to her mother.

“She misses me a lot,” Nastya said. “She wants to know all about me, actually. What I’m doing here? What do I eat here as well?”

Nastya said she usually buys her own food at the “little Chinese market” (it’s a bodega) across the street. Mostly apples and strawberry ice cream. “I like ice cream very much,” she said.

On a bed in the living room Alexandra Sandor, 17, of Romania, was engrossed in her laptop and a bottle of Coke. She is rod-skinny, with pouty lips, perfect baby skin and wavy brown hair. She wore Hello Kitty pajamas. She had come down with a lung infection but had been a trooper and suffered through the Lela Rose show.

. . .

She took a swig of Coke. “I love Coke,” she said. On her headboard rested a giant log of Toblerone and a carton of Marboro Lights. There was a Titanic DVD on the floor amongst pairs of high heels. “I could live on chocolate and Coca-Cola only, I think.”

“I found a very good sandwich from Starbucks,” said Maria. “So usually I’m eating that one in the morning, if I have time. If not, I’m just taking something from the shop — like chocolate.”

Why do models like chocolate so much?

“Because it’s good, it has a good taste.”

Over on the couch sat Tanya Chubko, the oldest girl in the house at 20. She wore all black and was chain-smoking while playing solitaire on her laptop. Her red hair was pulled back, exhibiting those big blues Nastya so admires.

. . .

In the year and a half since, she’s traveled much of America and Europe. Her favorite place so far is Italy’s Amalfi coast. Her favorite food in America is McDonald’s. “I really love Big Mac. I know it’s not good. I used to love chocolate, I was crazy about chocolate when I was younger, but not as much any more.”

But it’s never too soon to start thinking about next summer:

Each autumn, Portfolio Boys and Girls descend on New York’s top law firms, applying for jobs as summer associates. Who can blame them? Summer associates earn over $3,000 a week, work reasonable hours on interesting projects, and lunch at Jean Georges. And just as certain sleeve cuts are all the rage at Fashion Week, some law firms are “hot” — and some are not. Having interviewed with firms exactly 10 years ago, I was curious: Who is this fall’s “It” Firm?

As it turns out, the answer depends on what type of student you are and which crowd you hang with. Here’s what I learned from my decidedly unscientific survey of law student opinions about law firms.

. . .

According to Rob, a 2L at NYU, one firm that’s in demand this season is Davis Polk & Wardwell. Why? “I’ve heard they have good-looking associates.”

Some things never change. When I interviewed a decade ago, Davis was already known as a bastion of beauty on aesthetically challenged Lexington Avenue. It was the firm of choice for the prom queen and king of my law school class — the editor in chief of the law journal, a luminous doll-like beauty with a vast family fortune, and her Abercrombie-handsome future husband. They were joined at Davis by enough comely Asian females to cast Memoirs of a Geisha.

. . .

Lifestyle types also still gravitate toward perennial favorites Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, known for cultivating a quirky, pleasingly academic atmosphere, and Debevoise & Plimpton, which relentlessly works the whole “we’re Big Law but we’re nice” angle. The firm Web site even features MP3 clips recorded by current associates, who gush over Debevoise and use the word “collegial” in every other sentence. (But query whether these testimonials sound a little like tape recordings from hostages to their families.)

Debevoise recently topped The American Lawyer’s “A-List” ranking of leading law firms for the fourth consecutive year. But word on the street is that some associates aren’t happy campers. Maybe it’s because of all those “MJW Specials”: massive internal investigations of major international corporations, reeled in by Mary Jo White, former U.S. attorney for Manhattan and rainmaker extraordinaire. While such long-running and lucrative matters are great for Debevoise, they’re not much fun for associates — who get shipped away for weeks at a time, to review documents in a warehouse in Munich.

Smug bicyclists are bad enough but smug fashionable bicyclists are another story:

Meet the beautiful bicycle girls of New York, a breed that bears little resemblance to the hard-charging, Spandex-short-wearing species of 20 years ago. Those women were athletes, pumping the pedals, fighting to win. Getting somewhere. Today’s girls — and one always thinks of them as girls, even if they’re well into their 40’s — are more meandering, their long legs flashing along the pot-holed alleys of SoHo and the boutique-lined bike lanes of the West Village. Eco-conscious and ethereal, they wear flowing frocks and gigantic sunglasses but never helmets. Their hair flutters in the breeze as they leave a trail of swooning male pedestrians in their perfumed wake. They’ve been known to weave up the Brooklyn Bridge, holding up traffic as they absent-mindedly chomp on almonds, steering through a stop sign while texting on their BlackBerries.

Local celebrities like the actresses Naomi Watts and Chloë Sevigny and the Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen have all championed living the green life in this most public and only incidentally calorie-burning way. “I go every day to work on my bike,” Ms. Bundchen told the Daily News a couple of years ago. “It’s faster than a car, and cheaper.”

. . .

Melissa Broder, 28, senior publicist for Penguin Group books, often gets compliments on her bright pink vintage Columbia Rambler with a matching helmet.

“The whole green thing wasn’t my original intention when I first started, but it’s an added way to feel self-satisfied,” she said, pulling over her bike at the corner of University Place and Ninth Street. “I definitely feel a little snotty about it now.”

She was in a simple cotton black dress with cream-colored embroidery around the collar and snacking on some Soy Crisps while she rode.

“But mainly it’s just the best way to get around,” Ms. Broder said. “I get a lot of comments on the matching helmet, people are surprised.”

The will of the people lies in the hands of elected representatives:

The Republican leader of the City Council is fighting back against one of the most common criticisms of the 51-member body: that it wastes its time by renaming dozens of streets each year.

Council Member James Oddo of Staten Island is introducing a bill that would give the city’s Department of Transportation a responsibility currently held by the council, calling for the agency to sign off on new street names once they are approved by local community boards.

Council members would, however, still have the authority to call up a street name for a hearing and vote so long as six or more other members support doing so. Mr. Oddo said he likes the tradition of renaming streets in the city, but said, “The council has other pressing matters to handle.”

In 2006, the council approved 127 new street and place names; on May 30, it approved another 50, including naming an intersection after a dancer and choreographer, Alvin Ailey, and a street after an actor, Jerry Orbach.

. . .

Mr. Oddo admitted that he doesn’t think there will be widespread support for his plan.

Some parents send their children to Montessori school. Others, the Blue Man Group:

Bright colors, fun music . . . blue heads? While those are all staples at Blue Man Group shows, only the first two will be common elements at the theater group’s preschool next door to its 434 Lafayette St. theater, the Blue Man Creativity Center Early Childhood Program. Gearing up for its first year of operation for 2-through-4-year-olds, the center pulls from the sights and sounds of the Blue Man Group, focusing on “sensory tactile experiences” that help children grow emotionally and creatively.

“We draw inspiration from the educational philosophies that children do some of their most important learning through play,” the center explains on its Web site, theblueschool.net.

With a logo that incorporates a splash of paint, an electrical plug and a DNA double helix and a Web site that includes everything from a white paper on tot conflict resolution to a link to the Blue Man Group’s online create-your-own-art game, the program looks to address the needs of the whole child by way of creative expression. According to the school’s philosophy, such expression is a means of exploring and understanding both one’s own emotions and those of others.

. . .

The Blue School expects to eventually run through the eighth grade.

And here I thought those higher office rumors had all been unfounded*:

With a nod to Senator Schumer, Mayor Bloomberg is putting to rest that pesky gossip about a bid for national office: He says he does not want to be the nation’s next attorney general. “Despite any rumors you may have heard, I did not come to Washington as part of a stealth campaign to become the new attorney general,” Mayor Bloomberg quipped to an audience at the National Press Club that appeared well-versed in the rampant speculation about his aspirations for the White House.

. . .

[T]he mayor did poke a little fun at [Senator Schumer] over some “nasty comments” Mr. Schumer made about the condition of New York City’s bridges following the collapse of the Interstate 35W span in Minnesota earlier this month. Drawing laughter, Mr. Bloomberg recalled pointing out that three weeks earlier, Mr. Schumer’s wife, who was the city’s transportation commissioner, had pronounced the bridges in “great shape.”

After delivering a speech on poverty, the mayor issued his ritual denial of a presidential run. But he was spotted outside the National Press Building posing for photographs with supporters holding “Bloomberg ‘08″ signs.

*Is a MBA a good enough substitute for a law degree (not that you necessarily need one . . .)?

The “-packing” suffix trend is something that must be quickly and quietly eliminated:

Though other areas of the city offer one or a few of these services, Union Square is becoming a one-stop destination for those who consider themselves health-conscious, eco-friendly and deserving of the kind of spiritual and bodily nurturing that in the past was mainly the province of spa vacations. If the meatpacking district is where you go to party, Union Square is where you detoxify.

“We call it the wheatpacking district,” said Lisa Blau, who with Amanda Freeman founded VitalJuiceDaily.com, an e-mail newsletter devoted to healthy living that they publish from an office in the neighborhood.

What’s next? Downtown Brooklyn as the Courtpacking District? The neighborhoods served by the 6 line now comprise the Seatpacking District? Will the area the Brooklyn Gun Court is targeting become known as the Heatpacking District? Can 8th Street keep up its reputation as the city’s Feetpacking District?

This is New York, not L.A. — you shouldn’t have to suck up to Scientologists:

A Queens legislator — who insists a controversial detoxification program he’s promoting in lower Manhattan isn’t a front for Scientology — attended a celebrity-studded Los Angeles gala sponsored by the Church of Scientology.

City Councilman Hiram Monserrate said he paid his own way Saturday to the glitzy Hollywood event celebrating the 38th anniversary of the Church of Scientology Celebrity Center.

. . .

Monserrate had earlier sponsored a council proclamation honoring L. Ron Hubbard, who founded Scientology.

But Monserrate said his trip was strictly personal.

“I have some friends who are Scientologists and they invited me and I went,” he said.

Earlier: Sciento(xico)logy.

Councilmembers continue the heavy lifting at City Hall:

One down. Two more to go. City lawmakers are now hoping to slap a symbolic ban on the words “bitch” and “ho.”

Councilwoman Darlene Mealy (D-Brooklyn) is calling for a halt on the use of the two sexist slurs, which are popular in rap lyrics.

“When these words are used, they injure all women,” Mealy told the Daily News.

Mealy’s resolution, introduced last week, comes after the Council unanimously approved a similar stance on the N-word in March.

The resolutions are not legally enforceable bans. Instead, they are designed to persuade the music industry and young people to take the insults out of their vocabulary.

If Bush ramps up the terror threat level whenever a political disaster strikes, does Bloomberg similarly hype the presidential talk whenever he needs to stay relevant? Got a critical congestion pricing vote Thursday? Unveil mike2008.com today:

Mayor Bloomberg insists he’s not running for President, but he has put a provocatively named mike2008.com Web site on the Internet.

It links directly to Bloomberg’s recently relaunched personal Web site, mikebloomberg.com, where Hizzoner keeps the public posted on the causes he’s supported in business, philanthropy and government.

Bloomberg spokesman Robert Lawson said the mayor’s use of mike2008.com has no connection to speculation he may run for President next year.

“The Web administrators control a number of Bloomberg-specific [addresses] to prevent cyber-squatters and redirect users to mikebloomberg.com,” Lawson said.

Other Web addresses — such as mbloomberg.com, michaelbloomberg.com and mike2007.com — also link to the mayor’s site.

Lawson said the mayor decided to link all those addresses because he wanted to make sure anyone looking for information about him got to his site.

. . .

The mayor is scheduled to travel to St. Louis today to speak at the National Urban League, an organization that will hear from the leading Democratic presidential candidates on Friday.

The fact that they’re completely flouting immigration law is not nearly the worst part of it:

“There’s kind of a mutually agreed unspoken agreement among mothers that all the normal rules about racism are off when you’re talking about nannies,” said one book editor in her early 30’s who asked not to be identified because her Filipina nanny is illegal. “People talk about ethnicity in a way they never would at any other time. Even people who are very aware of not making racial stereotypes will put that on hold when talking to other mothers.”

“Part of it is just a shorthand way of saying what you’re looking for, and what qualities you’d like to instill in your children,” the book editor continued. “Before I knew that Tibetan nannies were a status thing, a friend’s friend was telling me that they were the very best. You hear that Filipina nannies are the best because they have a history of being caretakers in the Philippines. You hear that Caribbean nannies are a bit tough, so they’re good if you have an unruly child with discipline issues.”

Lucy Kaylin, the executive editor of Marie Claire and author of The Perfect Stranger: The Truth About Mothers and Nannies, explained that many mothers are simply grasping at anything in the arsenal that might help them make what is at base a very emotional decision.

“As a good liberal, I certainly recoil at the labeling of people based on where they come from,” Ms. Kaylin said. “But among the mommy ranks it is strongly felt that you can make these distinctions. Some of the more common stereotypes that you hear are that Filipina nannies are deferential and quiet, whereas Caribbean nannies might be more inclined to be assertive about how the child should be dealt with. You hear that Latina nannies are very affectionate, and that English nannies and German nannies will run a tight ship.”

“When it comes to this high-risk critical juncture in your life as a family, you find people talking in terms that they would never normally use in polite society,” Ms. Kaylin continued. “Mothers caught in the grip of the nanny search can get a bit crazy. You’re desperate for clarity and information, and you find yourself poking around in realms of your psyche that you thought were well sealed off.”

Though much — some say most — nanny-hiring in the New York area is done illegally, the directors of Manhattan’s nanny-placement agencies are quick to point out that requesting a nanny from a particular nation or ethnic group runs afoul of U.S. anti-discrimination laws.

Joan Friedman, who has run the A Choice Nanny placement agency with her husband since 1991, said that she frequently hears requests from families for a nanny from a particular ethnic group.

“I don’t think people are trying to discriminate,” Ms. Friedman said. “I think it’s a simple lack of education about what the laws are in terms of discrimination. It’s funny. I’ll get a call from a family one day saying, ‘Please get us a Filipina nanny no matter what.’ And then the next day I’ll get a call saying, ‘We’ll take anything but a Filipina nanny.’”

Oh man, I hope their friends ride them about this:

You’re watching a Seinfeld rerun, or the late-night news on the WB. Cut to commercial. “Woke up this morning/ Cable’s triple play in my head . . .” It sounds familiar, doesn’t it? There’s a pretty girl on your TV, dancing and singing in a huge, loft-like space, wind blowing through her dark hair, glossy lips shining, sequins flashing. You’ve seen her before. But where? And that catchy pop-ska beat — it’s all so familiar. “One simple connection/ One low price all on one bill . . .” Wait, here comes the hook! “I want it all! Yeah, I want it all!” And the band sings, “1.800.OKCable, Cable’s got it all.” Now you’ve got it. It’s the 1.800.OKCable band!

Is this a real band? Can they be serious? It is. They are.

The band is called Future 86, and the 1.800.OKCable commercial on which they sing has been driving New Yorkers batty for months.

Future 86’s road to local TV saturation began five years ago, when guitarist Larry Nimmo, from Queens, and drummer Armand Minassian, of New Jersey, put an ad out in The Village Voice. They wanted to start a rock band and they needed a singer. Spunky Courtney Samborsky, then a student at the musical theater program at New York University, answered the call.

The band didn’t want to change the world or reinvent rock music. They just wanted to play some shows and get the people dancing. So they plugged away at local nightspots, working up a handful of 80’s covers and a few originals that they’d try to squeeze in when the bar manager wasn’t looking. They changed band names a few times — first they were Eve’s Design, then Pretty Suicides — until they finally settled on Future 86 after seeing signs for the prospective interstate highway en route to gigs. They recorded two albums on small budgets and sold them online, in between sets and at some local record stores.

This spring, they got a call from Jennifer Brooke, cofounder of Forever Films, a Long Island–based production company. She was looking for a local band — nothin’ fancy — to sing on a commercial for 1.800.OKCable, a company that packages Internet, TV and phone service together. They weren’t selling out the Garden, but still . . . !

After trawling MySpace for talent, Ms. Brooke and her partner, Beatrice Alda, discovered Future 86 (among about a dozen other bands). They particularly liked the song “I Want It All,” which with a few minor tweaks could easily be transposed to the thematic needs of an 1.8OO.OKCable ad campaign. And the little-known group would probably work for cheap — or even free.

. . .

In due time, the lyrics Woke up this morning/No sunshine on my head became Woke up this morning/Cable’s Triple Play in my head. And Woke up this morning/Couldn’t wait to get out of bed became Craving TV and Internet and Phone/Is what I said. “You’re watching Future 86 but they happen to be talking about cable,” Ms. Brooke said.

Public response, however, has not been so enthusiastic. It seems some people resent getting a catchy song stuck in their heads after repeated, unsolicited airings, especially when that catchy song is about something as mundane as cable TV and Internet service.

. . .

The band seemed slightly perplexed by the sometimes harsh reaction to their music. “Don’t these guys have anything better to do?” wondered Mr. Minassian, the drummer.

Ms. Samborsky specifically defended the artistic integrity of “I Want It All” — which, like most of the band’s original material, she wrote with Mr. Nimmo. “Everyone is searching for something that means something to them,” she said vaguely. “We’re all craving something more, better.”

Like WNYC’s attempts to cash in on its wonky, somewhat female-overloaded Soterios Johnson-loving unattached demographic, the new Whole Foods on Houston is hosting events for, er, thin-slicing singles:

Over samples of aged Gouda and amid aisles of extra-virgin olive oil, New Yorkers shopping at Whole Foods Bowery are turning the grocery into a thriving pick-up scene. The gelato bar, the upstairs café, the chilled, private cheese room, and long checkout lines are where flirting is most rampant in the 71,000-square-foot store that opened last March, Whole Foods employees said.

. . .

While many pick-up lines fall flat, single shoppers said the floodlit aisles provide a “safer” space to start up conversations with strangers than most bars in the neighborhood. Peeking into each other’s grocery carts, they said, could also be more revealing of a person’s lifestyle choices than an online profile on a social networking or dating Web site.

“I’m really health conscious,” a 28-year-old singer in the band edible red, Collette McLafferty, said. “I want to date health conscious people, and that could be why Whole Foods seems like a good place to meet people.”

After chatting with an attractive man at Whole Foods two nights ago but forgetting his name, Ms. McLafferty, who lives on the Lower East Side, posted a message on Craigslist looking to reconnect with him.

“He had dark, curly brown hair, blue eyes, he was well built, probably about 5-feet-10,” she said. She is waiting for a response to her posting, she said. Ms. McLafferty, who said she has often been approached by shoppers who comment on the tattoo of a dragon around her upper arm, added that flirting was easy at Whole Foods because of low expectations. “When you go out with the intention of meeting someone, you never meet anyone,” she said.

. . .

“I make eyes at people,” a 27-year-old actor who lives near South Street Seaport, Ari Rossen, said. “It’s a hip neighborhood, everyone who shops here is young, and there are plenty of things around to talk about.”

Whole Foods Bowery is actively boosting its reputation as a place for singles to meet, a spokeswoman for the store, Rebecca Ulanoff, said. In August, the store is hosting “Check Out,” a singles night co-sponsored by the Web site Gothamist.com. The store is also hoping to attract a fashion-forward, eco-friendly crowd tomorrow morning when it sells Anya Hindmarch shopping totes printed with the message: “I’m Not a Plastic Bag.”

I guess the singles events at the Pathmark by the Manhattan Bridge were sparsely attended?

Potential sociology dissertation topic ca. 2014: “The Rise Of The Co-Optation Of Interpersonal Relationships By Corporate Entities In The 21st Century.”

What’s the most ridiculous aspect of the Bloomberg for President hype? Is it New York City’s nationwide agenda? Is it the Genesis-like porterhouse-fueled dare myth? No, it’s the speculation that Hizzoner would reconfigure the Oval Office to accommodate his signature “bullpen” layout:

The Oval Office is among the most recognizable symbols of the American presidency, but if Mayor Bloomberg ends up in the White House, the real business of the country could get done down the hall.

If history is an indication, Mr. Bloomberg will want to reconfigure some area of the White House to make room for an open, newsroom-style office if he’s elected president. Since his days as the founder and CEO of the information technology company Bloomberg L.P., the mayor has opted to forgo a private corner office to work in a “bullpen” surrounded by his top lieutenants and aides. Starting today, Mr. Bloomberg’s bullpen is moving to the city’s emergency command center in Brooklyn for two weeks while the City Hall workspace gets an electrical upgrade and a fresh coat of paint.

The rearranging of the White House furniture hinges, of course, on a lot of ifs — with the top two being if Mr. Bloomberg decides to run and if he wins. But those who have followed his career or worked in the White House say if Mr. Bloomberg does become the next commander-in-chief he will be able to find a space for his beloved bullpen at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

“He could go to the Old Executive Office [Building], which is across the alley. There’s a space on the third floor there where he could create a bullpen about the size that he has at City Hall,” a Republican strategist and former assistant to President Reagan, Edward Rollins, said.

Mr. Rollins, who worked in the White House between 1981 and 1986 with some time off for Mr. Reagan’s re-election campaign, said creating a bullpen in the West Wing would be next to impossible because it would require “knocking down the Oval Office, the Cabinet Room, and the Roosevelt Room.”

Confirmation of what we always sensed was the case:

Williamsburg is known for cool bistros and trendy hangouts, but few realize that the neighborhood and its environs are a magnet for hip, young librarians. Although “hip” is not an adjective generally associated with librarians, a stack of archivists, publishers, illustrators, librarians, and other bibliophiles called the Desk Set is out to challenge their image as staid.

The traditional idea of a librarian is “uptight in a bun,” the group’s co-founder, Maria Falgoust, said. “It would be nice if we could change that.”

To follow up on a well-attended Desk Set dance party Memorial Day weekend at Enid’s in Greenpoint, Ms. Falgoust is planning a screening of “Desk Set,” the 1957 Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy romantic comedy from which the group took its name, for the end of this month. She is also considering a Labor Day weekend dance party.

“Being smart and having fun are not opposites,” a digital imaging specialist at the Brooklyn Museum, Sarah Gentile, who has a master’s degree in library science, said at the Desk Set dance party. Ms. Gentile and others wore pins with such statements as “Withdrawn” or “She blinded me with Library Science.” The mood was more merriment than Merriam-Webster.

“Prepare to be shushed!” read the announcement for the event, at which the reference desk revelers downed cocktails with Dewey Decimal numbers instead of names. No one guessed the identity of a concoction of Champagne and raspberry vodka that had the call number of “The Joy of Sex.” Lime Rickeys were served in honor of F. Scott Fitzgerald, as was gin and pineapple juice, said to be a favorite of Vladimir Nabokov.

. . .

At Enid’s, the crowd was checking out each other rather than books.

“I wore my glasses because I wanted to maximize my look,” a children’s librarian, Andrea Vaughn, said. “I already got hit on,” she added. “It’s working.”

The only thing worse than professional competitive eaters (and try explaining that concept to people in somewhere like, oh, I don’t know, Sub-Saharan Africa) are the walk-ons:

Professional eaters Arturo Rios “Grande” Jr. and Allen “The Shredder” Goldstein scarfed more than two dozen soggy hot dogs apiece yesterday, earning them a spot in next week’s Coney Island showdown.

Rios, 30, of Long Branch, N.J., edged Goldstein, 43, of Plainview, N.Y., by eating 27.5 hot dogs in 12 minutes, a personal all-time best for the divorced father of three who nearly lost his free lunch at the end of the contest at the Manhattan Mall’s food court.

“It’s like any sport, when you try to go that extra mile, try to do that little extra bit, it takes a lot,” Rios said. “And it’s more than physical ability. It’s mental.”

Rios trailed Goldstein — who finished with 26 downed dogs — for most of the match. Both men, who were the only professional eaters in yesterday’s lineup, doused their dogs and buns in liquid (water for Goldstein, fruit punch for Rios) before ramming them down their throats. Watery bits of buns stuck on their faces, and by the final bell, Rios and Goldstein were hovering near a trash can.

“I got it all in and then I had to cough,” Rios said of the final seconds. “My daughter got me sick a few days ago.”

Rios claimed to hold the record for pig feet at 6.6 pounds in 10 minutes.

. . .

The contest had been billed as a chance for an “ordinary eater” or civil servant to join next week’s ultra-competitive field.

City correction officer Edward Ritchie, 30, finished third with 9.5 dogs. Other entrants included Dept. of Homeland Security employee John Sclafani, 34th Street vendor David Brokenbaugh and Loyola College student Donny Lind.

Were it not for all this talk of his possible run for president, he might just be another impotent lame duck mayor no one paid attention to — one whose only power lay in encouraging people to save electricity:

He has a degree in electrical engineering, but even Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday he was surprised to learn that portable chargers draw electricity when they’re plugged in and not in use.

“I always assumed that chargers for my BlackBerry, which I had plugged in at one end and there’s no BlackBerry [attached], wasn’t using any electricity,” the mayor said. “I was wrong.”

So the mayor recommended that New Yorkers unplug appliances and charging devices whenever practical, one of 10 suggestions that will be part of a multimillion-dollar multimedia campaign to create more environmental awareness in the city through small steps.