Copyright 2008 The New York Sun Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:42:46 -0400 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Pranay Gupte :: Stories from The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/authors/Pranay+Gupte istoll@nysun.com (Ira Stoll) webmaster@nysun.com en-us PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/foreign/abu-dhabi-hosts-thinkers-fte/65315/ Fri, 26 Oct 2007 00:00:00 EST ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — Of the 22 countries that constitute the Arab League, only three have formal diplomatic ties with Israel. The United Arab Emirates is not among them. It would be fair to suggest, though, that the UAE — far more than Egypt, Jordan, and Mauritania, which maintain legations in Tel Aviv — is far more of an open society, far less hostile to Jewry, and much more welcoming to Western and, specifically, American, economic, political, and cultural interests. With a... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/business/jim-michaels-86-inspirational-editor-at-forbes/63954/ Thu, 4 Oct 2007 00:00:00 EST Jim Michaels, who died Tuesday at 86, liked to say India was, for him, the cradle of civilization, and that India was also, for him, the cradle of his journalism. As a young reporter for what was then United Press, he traveled to the Indian subcontinent in the 1940s, shortly after World War II ended. He witnessed Mahatma Gandhi's nonviolent movement of satyagraha for independence from the British Raj, he saw the violence that resulted from the partitioning of India into secular India and... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/foreign/wal-mart-receives-permission-to-form-alliance/44486/ Fri, 1 Dec 2006 03:24:23 EST After years of trying to crack the $300 billion Indian retail market, Wal-Mart has received permission from the government of Prime Minister Singh to form an alliance with one of the country's largest telecommunications consortiums and launch stores to serve India's 1.1 billion people. The deal between Wal-Mart and the consortium, the Bharti Group, has been cleverly structured to get around the government's continuing ban on foreign companies operating independent retail stores. Under the deal... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/foreign/lebanon-analysis-anti-syrian-lebanese-christian/43924/ Wed, 22 Nov 2006 00:00:00 EST The assassination in Beirut yesterday of a prominent leader of Lebanon's anti-Syrian Christian community, Pierre Gemayel, deepened the country's sectarian crisis, and created a new opportunity for Hezbollah to transform the secular state into an Islamic theocratic one irrevocably opposed to the existence of Israel. The murder also triggered new concern on the part of the Bush administration about a region that has already been burdened with uncertainty over the Iraq war, Syria's bellicosity... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/foreign/india-pakistan-talks-the-audience-is-in-washington/43681/ Thu, 16 Nov 2006 00:00:00 EST The talks between high-level Indian and Pakistani diplomats in New Delhi this week on security issues have been mainly make-nice, a well-intentioned effort aimed not so much at domestic constituents but at a faraway player whose beneficence both countries covet. That player is President Bush. More than any American president, he has engaged Washington more closely with the two nuclear powers, whose mutual enmity has been exceeded only by their rivalry in recent years for America's affections... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/using-education-to-redress-the-worlds-unfairness/36691/ Tue, 25 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Nina Avidar Weiner is not an equal opportunity educator. She believes, in fact, that youths from underprivileged circumstances ought to be afforded enhanced opportunities to become equal with other young people. She believes, moreover, that by empowering boys and girls in this manner, a new cadre of intellectual leadership will be created — one that, in turn, ensures the well-being of a succeeding generation of disadvantaged youths. And Ms. Weiner believes that her record as an educator over... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/foreign/long-sorry-story-of-an-artificial-nation/36669/ Tue, 25 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST For journalists of a certain generation, the physical carnage in Lebanon and northern Israel brings back haunting memories of conflicts that once seemed certain to go on forever. The fratricide of 1975–90 that the Lebanese called their civil war certainly did not seem to suggest an end. Maronite Christians battled Sunni and Shiite Muslims, and Palestinian Arabs — who came to Lebanon as refugees in earlier years — were driven by their manipulative leader, Yasser Arafat, into participating in a... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/gael-greene-on-the-joy-of-eating/36558/ Mon, 24 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Gael Greene is in the middle of her moment. "I savor life in the present tense," the veteran restaurant critic and author said. "To be able to savor the joy of the moment in the middle of that moment is a gift that my friends find contagious." That joy is often apparent when she's partaking of a meal. A look at her extraordinary career prompts the thought that the five decades of Ms. Greene's adulthood could be anatomized through the meals she's had in New York, across America, and in Europe... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/marketing-and-living-the-luxury-goods-experience/36474/ Fri, 21 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Nina Kaminer puts her money where her marketing is. "I help create the magic of the luxury-goods experience, and I'm fortunate enough to be able to live that experience," the president and founder of Nike Communications Inc. said. The Bronx-born Ms. Kaminer — who started her company 22 years ago when she was barely out of Amherst College, where she majored in the classics — is widely regarded as a prime public relations architect for the marketing of the luxury-goods industry.The industry's... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/add-novelist-to-the-long-list-of-maura-moynihans/36413/ Thu, 20 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Maura Moynihan has a new avatar. "Yes, I absolutely believe in reincarnation," the daughter of one of New York's most revered public figures, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, said with an ever so slight bow, closing her eyes and joining her hands in the steepled, age-old form of paying obeisance to another person or to one's own good fortune. "My life has been a journey through many avatars," Ms. Moynihan said. Among them: as a singer whose career was launched by Andy Warhol, and whose face was... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/restaurateurs-serve-up-optimism-for-downtown/36306/ Wed, 19 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Reika Yo of Tokyo and Martin Shapiro of Brooklyn have found common cause in Manhattan. That cause is the sustainable development of downtown, where Ms. Yo runs an acclaimed restaurant that will soon celebrate its second anniversary, EN Japanese Brasserie. Mr. Shapiro, a well-known restaurateur who once ran the popular discothθque Regine's, is managing partner of the Tribeca Grill, a local landmark for the past 16 years. "It's not as though this is a depressed neighborhood, but downtown has... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/developer-brothers-erect-huge-structures-step-out/36206/ Tue, 18 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST The Brothers Zeckendorf are on a roll. "Yes, it's fair to say that we're optimistic," Arthur Zeckendorf said. "Things are going well. There have been no shortages of setbacks, but we're very resilient." Older brother William Lie Zeckendorf, also co-chairman of Zeckendorf Development LLC, added: "In New York, your name counts only as long as you're in business. 'New York' and nostalgia don't go together. We've found that this is not a sentimental town when it comes to doing business. You could... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/opinion/pity-the-nation/36221/ Tue, 18 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Pity the nation. First it was Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization that tried to hijack Lebanon in the 1970s and transform it into a permanent cantonment to fight Israel. Now it's the Islamists of Hezbollah who are using it as a launch pad against the Jewish State. Pity the nation. Sixteen years after the Taif Accord that the Saudis brokered to end 15 years of civil war between Christians and Muslims in Lebanon, this Mediterranean country — often called the Switzerland of the... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/opinion/war-set-to-intrude-on-the-g8-summit/36040/ Fri, 14 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST President Bush arrives Friday in the historic Russian city of St. Petersburg for the annual summit of the industrialized nations known as the Group of Eight, a gathering that President Putin, at least, had hoped would repair fraying political relations between America and Russia, and also strengthen economic channels between the two countries. But both men found themselves scrambling yesterday to deal with an entirely unexpected item that's now certain to appear in the agenda for the summit... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/humor-friendships-led-conference-board-chief/36043/ Fri, 14 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Richard Cavanagh wears his humor as only an Irishman can. "To have a sense of the absurd, to look at the lighter side of life, to lighten others' burdens by making them laugh: I get great satisfaction out of that," the president and CEO of the Conference Board said. "My humor springs from observing what people are sensitive about, what they're embarrassed about, what they find ironic. What I find most fruitful is conducting myself in a happy and nice way. I avoid being mean-spirited," he said... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/evangelist-for-technology-who-helped-invent/35964/ Thu, 13 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Sreenath Sreenivasan is irrepressible. Today, for example, he will help welcome hundreds journalists, teachers, and businesspeople to Columbia University, where he's dean of students at the Graduate School of Journalism. They will participate in a four-day annual convention featuring stars of Internet, print, radio, and television who will offer workshops and seminars of special value to journalists of South Asian origin and to non-South Asians interested in South Asia — one of the most... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/foreign/how-hezbollah-terrorists-slowly-took-control/35987/ Thu, 13 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST The ubiquitous presence of young men in yellow T-shirts in front of McDonald's on Beirut's fabled corniche says it all. They are worn by Hezbollah acolytes, who stop vehicles and demand contributions for the cause. They receive few rejections. It used to be that these young men — most of them hirsute, others with a pre-teenage breakout of wispy facial hair and acne — would turn up on Fridays, Islam's holy day of prayer and alms giving, on the elegant, palmlined corniche. They would set up a... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/opinion/nyc-india-are-joined-in-the-war/35871/ Wed, 12 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST The deadly bomb blasts during the evening rush hours in Mumbai yesterday targeted innocent commuters in India's clangorous commercial capital at a time when it had been rapidly evolving into a regional financial hub with deepening ties to American companies. But the bombs were most certainly aimed at undermining America's confidence in the Bush administration's newest — and arguably most robust — ally in the campaign against global Islamic terrorism. The blasts also demonstrated the special... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/bar-associations-president-on-same-sex-marriage/35894/ Wed, 12 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Barry Kamins is New York's latest legatee and legend. "It's a very humbling experience to become president of an association whose list of past presidents include names such as Elihu Root, Charles Evan Hughes, and Cyrus Vance," Mr. Kamins, the new head of the Bar Association of the City of New York, said. The fact that he's become the 62nd president of a prestigious organization whose members include 23,000 of the city's 75,000 lawyers isn't what's made him a legend. Rather, it's the fact that... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/she-has-an-eye-for-spirituality-culture/35774/ Tue, 11 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Audrey Ronning Topping has many eyes. There's the eye for spirituality, a generational gift that she traces to her grandparents, the Reverend Halvor Ronning and Hannah Rorem. They established the first Norwegian Lutheran mission in China in 1891. There's the eye for culture and diplomacy, another generational gift. She attributes this to her father, the famous Canadian envoy Chester Ronning. There's her eye for societal details, which she ascribes to the long years that she spent traveling the... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/her-next-challenge-is-reinventing-the-liz/35742/ Mon, 10 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Pamela Thomas-Graham says she's come full circle to the tenets of her childhood. "I was brought up to challenge myself, to try to be successful on my own terms. I was brought up to be focused," the group president of Liz Claiborne Inc. said. "So I see myself as more fully engaged than ever before." Just how engaged can be adduced from the fact that, barely nine months into one of the most prestigious jobs in the $180 billion apparel industry, Ms. Thomas-Graham and her team are reinventing one... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/his-intellectual-curiosity-has-been-widely/35595/ Fri, 7 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Morris Mark can see beyond the horizon. "I've found that a common denominator of successful people is a vision of what's going to happen," the president of Mark Asset Management, one of the city's best-known financiers, said. He's too modest to claim any special success, of course, but Mr. Mark said that he has always possessed a willingness to take risks — risk-taking based not only on perceptions of value but also future changes in value. Translation: Morris Mark, born in Flatbush, Brooklyn... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/manhattan-school-of-music-as-meditational/35550/ Thu, 6 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Nothing encroaches on Robert Sirota when he makes music. "That isn't a rational choice, or a calculated choice," the president of the Manhattan School of Music said. "I simply cannot imagine doing anything else. Composing for me is like being in a meditational well - you need to develop tremendous powers of concentration." Those powers are prodigious. Sitting at a restored Ivers & Pond piano for nearly two hours each morning, he composes with pen and paper. Tapping into that meditational... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/her-cakes-have-kept-buildings-standing/35359/ Fri, 30 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Louise Nicholson bakes "useful cakes." Cakes are designed to be edible and delicious - so what's this "useful" stuff? "I started making those cakes while I was at Edinburgh University," the celebrated British art historian, author, filmmaker, travel entrepreneur, conservationist, and gadfly said. "I became known for my thematic cakes. I would bake them to mark some event or cause." One time, Ms. Nicholson made a thematic cake was when two architectural historian friends decided to get married... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/mother-india/35250/ Thu, 29 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Durga Jasraj is, well, Mother India. It sometimes seems that her classic face - carved from the genes of two of India's most prominent artistic families - is everywhere. In a modern society in an ancient land, where half the population of 1.1 billion is younger than 25, that face captures the ethos and ambitions of the world's fourth-biggest economy, one into which Americans are pouring unprecedented investment. It is also a face that invites attention to the fact that, notwithstanding the... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/spanish-harlem-benefits-from-her-moose-jaw/35195/ Wed, 28 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Elaine Givenchy Woo of Saskatchewan feels at home in Spanish Harlem. "I grew up in a small town that was multicultural," Ms. Woo, a teacher at the East Harlem Tutorial Program, said. "From an early age, I was comfortable with people from different societies. I took it for granted that the world was diverse and that such diversity helped us gain wonderful experiences." She grew up in Moose Jaw, in the northeastern Canadian province of Saskatchewan, where her father, Jack, owned - and still runs... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/after-berlin-wall-fell-they-led-the-rise/35059/ Mon, 26 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST James Greenfield and Nancy Ward set up shops around the world to help people better tell and sell their stories. They do not necessarily start newspapers, magazines, and broadcasting centers. Instead, they work with local enterprises to broaden the reach of existing news organizations. In a world of galloping globalization where critics of America sometimes rail against perceived neocolonialism, Mr. Greenfield and Ms. Ward are careful not to be seen as exporters of American notions of good... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/voice-for-those-past-the-sex-and-the-city-bracket/34962/ Fri, 23 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Susan Silver is a funny girl. Anyone who wrote comedy for the acclaimed television programs "Maude," "The Bob Newhart Show," and "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" has to be a funny girl, right? Anyone who was an associate producer for the noted comedian Mort Sahl has to be a funny girl, isn't that so? Anyone who assisted the casting director of "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" has to be a funny girl, no? Anyone whom Johnny Carson cited on "The Tonight Show" has to be a funny girl, n'est ce pas? But Ms... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/demanding-teacher-relentless-lawmaker-charter/34889/ Thu, 22 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Eva Moskowitz was born with a teacher's tassel. She grew up near the precincts of Columbia University. Her father, Martin Moskowitz, was a well-known mathematician. Her mother, Anita, was an art historian. Her brother, Andre, was so fluent in languages that he became an interpreter. The parents supplemented her school studies by home instruction. And Ms. Moskowitz? "I always thought of myself as a teacher," the executive director of the Harlem Success Charter School said. That may explain why... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/force-behind-two-columbus-circle/34718/ Tue, 20 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Holly Hotchner is a Renaissance woman who believes that acquiring knowledge obligates action. The director of the Museum of Arts and Design learned about Classical art in Europe. She learned to restore 16th century Italian paintings from the master John Brealey. She learned to ride horses at a French circus training school in Normandy. She learned about the history of the Roman Catholic Church during travels across Europe. She learned art history at Trinity College in Connecticut. She learned... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/bringing-people-together-but-dont-call-it/34654/ Mon, 19 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Laurel Touby gives 240 parties a year in 12 cities across America, along with others in Berlin, London, Paris, and Toronto. "My parties are not about me - they are about my guests," the founder and chief executive officer of mediabistro.com said. "I'm there to facilitate their happiness, which means sometimes killing them with kindness." She has a lot of people to slay: Last month, 600,000 unique visitors availed themselves of her Web site; many of them sign up for its various services such as... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/seven-years-in-cunys-chancellor-moves-beyond/34562/ Fri, 16 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST As a famous mathematician, Matthew Goldstein is, naturally, familiar with a fecundity of formulas. As chancellor of the City University of New York, Mr. Goldstein abides by only one enduring formula: "Encourage competition, embrace smart people, and expand collaboration." Mr. Goldstein has done well by that formula at what's arguably America's most prominent public education system, with 450,000 students and 6,600 faculty members and an annual operating budget of $2 billion. Indeed, Mr... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/caretaker-of-a-much-coveted-family-flag/34488/ Thu, 15 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST James Power IV has enviable name recognition. While he was, of course, born with the name, Mr. Power had to work especially hard to earn the recognition. His father made sure of that. The brand that his Massachusetts born father, James David Power III, created three decades ago, "J.D. Power and Associates," is the world's best known marketing information services company. Its market research, forecasting, consulting, training, and customer satisfaction surveys are keenly awaited by consumers... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/opinion/india-makes-a-move/34504/ Thu, 15 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Word that India is going to nominate one of its nationals to be the next secretary-general of the United Nations signals a willingness by the world's biggest democracy to take a more activist role in multilateral politics. Its choice of Shashi Tharoor, which was scheduled to be announced overnight, suggests its endorsement of the world organization at a time when it is under severe assault for profligacy, mismanagement and ineffectiveness. Not that India has been diffident in the corridors of... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/he-helps-people-start-from-bottom-with-dignity/34406/ Wed, 14 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Ronald Bailey of New Orleans creates dead-end jobs in Harlem. "People have no idea what these so-called dead-end jobs are all about," the owner-operator of six McDonald's stores in Harlem said. "I have more than 300 young people working for me - mostly high school students - and there are 41 different areas that we teach. Each store has 10 stations. That means staff members learn everything from dealing with people to food preparation to handling money and looking after the facilities. I look... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/these-two-are-the-life-of-any-party/34325/ Tue, 13 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST It could be said that Melinda Konopko and Risa Meyer were born to do business together. They were, after all, born a day apart. In both women's lives, law and business cross-fertilize. Ms. Konopko's father, Bruce Gould, is a lawyer who became a judge; Ms. Meyer is a lawyer by training. Ms. Meyer's father, Alvin Meyer, helped start the mail order business in America; Ms. Konopko earned a master's degree in business from Harvard University. It could also be said that geography is part of their... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/paul-guenthers-journey-hits-high-note-at/34164/ Fri, 9 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Paul Guenther has done the rounds. He has been a securities analyst. He has been a banker. He has worked in retail. He has led a brokerage firm. He has been on the boards of not-for-profit institutions. He has tended a farm in the Catskills. For the last decade, Mr. Guenther has been chairman of the New York Philharmonic. "It's been a long journey that went very quickly," he said the other day. "My father always said, 'Do what you want to do - but do it well.' I've had the chance of doing what... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/opinion/you-can-call-me-al/34214/ Fri, 9 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Mark Malloch Brown of Britain may have launched Al Gore's next presidential campaign. After all, what are friends for? The jeremiad against America that the deputy secretary general of the United Nations issued in New York was directed at the Bush administration's supposed neglect of the 191-member world organization. But Mr. Malloch Brown's language and idiom were culled from Mr. Gore's playbook. For listeners of a certain generation, the rhetoric seemed similar to that of Mr. Gore, then a... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/boltons-welcome-to-new-york-is-cordial-for/34094/ Thu, 8 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST John Bolton is a tale of two cities. "When I was at law school, I decided that I was going to practice law in either Washington or New York," the U.S. permanent representative to the United Nations said. "As it happened, I started my career in Washington. But now I've done New York, too." Mr. Bolton obtained his law degree at Yale University. In fact, he's a Yalie through and through, having also received his undergraduate degree, summa cum laude, from the institution. Nearly all his... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/pulling-back-the-curtain-on-the-black-upper-class/33975/ Wed, 7 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Lawrence Otis Graham has a history with history. "My goal is to share the black experience by examining our collective history," the lawyer and author of bestselling books said. "I'm aiming to broaden the definition of what is to be black in contemporary America. But to understand that, we need to look at where we've been. I'm pulling back the curtain on the black upper class of today and years gone by." His efforts received wide national attention when Mr. Graham published "Our Kind of People... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/coming-soon-to-america-with-news-of-the-world/33901/ Tue, 6 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST George Alagiah plans to be in New York every day - without leaving his London base. It's not astral projection or a flying carpet that he will use for this feat, although either method would be perfectly understandable in view of his South Asian heritage. Mr. Alagiah's vehicle will be broadcasting. More specifically, it will be the British Broadcasting Corporation, where he is anchor of Britain's most widely watched television news program, "BBC Six O'Clock News." "This is a privilege that... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/at-81-greenberg-thinks-only-of-building/33853/ Mon, 5 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Maurice Greenberg isn't aging. Once a week, he hastens to a discreet facility on Manhattan's Upper West Side. There, the chairman and chief executive of C.V. Starr & Company Incorporated works out on fierce looking machines. "It's called the 'slow burn revolution,'" Mr. Greenberg said. "It involves half an hour of slow extreme exercise at Fred Hahn's Serious Strength. I have always been addicted to exercise. The effect on your metabolism is incredible. I work out until there's muscle... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/steve-forbes-tries-his-hand-at-agitating/33734/ Fri, 2 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Steve Forbes is moving into agitation. "I gave the presidency a good try - and I'm glad I ran," the erstwhile candidate for the Republican nomination in 1996 and 2000 said. "It's time to move on. Am I running again? No. My role now is in agitation." What sort of "agitation" is this? Coming from the president and editor in chief of Forbes, a man who's arguably the most prominent proselytizer of global capitalism, the very word - a staple of the left - sounded out of place. "My role as an... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/caretaker-for-the-battery/33685/ Thu, 1 Jun 2006 00:00:00 EST Warrie Price is living history. It's been that way, in fact, since her late teenage years back in Texas, when the father of a college roommate unexpectedly became the American president. The roommate's name was Lynda Bird Johnson. "Her mother, whom I called Mrs. J., asked me to come and live in the White House when Lyndon Johnson became president after the assassination of President Kennedy," Ms. Price said. "She wanted me to help Lynda and Luci, her daughters, through this traumatic transition... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/stabilizer-rides-high-on-strength-of-280-magazines/33589/ Wed, 31 May 2006 00:00:00 EST Jack Kliger is "the Stabilizer." "In the decade before I came in, the company had had three management and ownership changes," the president and chief executive officer of Hachette Filipacchi Media US Incorporated said. "When I was asked to become CEO in 1999, my mandate was to stabilize the company. It was a tough time to run a Europe-based company in America." It was, in fact, a tough time to run any magazine company. After nearly a decade of robust sales, the industry found itself hugely... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/with-le-cirque-set-to-reopen-its-owner-is-fit/33513/ Tue, 30 May 2006 00:00:00 EST Sirio Maccioni is in training. One reason is that his celebrated restaurant, Le Cirque, will have a formal reincarnation tomorrow. Another is that he's had to host a whirl of receptions these past few days to herald the opening. A third is that Mr. Maccioni at the same time has had to keep an eye on his other three restaurants - in Manhattan, Las Vegas, and Mexico. Most of all, Mr. Maccioni is in training because, like the movie, every night is a "Big Night" for him. Stamina counts. "In my... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/this-doctor-oversees-dom-perignons-dna/33444/ Fri, 26 May 2006 00:00:00 EST Richard Geoffroy projects the gentle gravitas of a physician, which is only natural because he is a physician by training. But his medical degree from the University of Rheims has little to do with his day job - chef de cave of the fabled French Champagne, Dom Perignon. "In fact, I never worked as a doctor," Mr. Geoffroy said the other day during a brief visit to New York. "I come from a family of seven generations of grape growers, but I went to medical school because I felt like doing... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/this-artists-works-are-part-of-the-skyline/33349/ Thu, 25 May 2006 00:00:00 EST To say that Edward Minskoff is a developer would be like saying Picasso was a painter. In fact, there is a nexus between the two. Mr. Minskoff, the founder and chairman of Edward J. Minskoff Equities Incorporated, creates tall buildings that are widely acclaimed as an art form. Picasso created works that took art to rarefied heights. Mr. Minskoff began working in the real estate business while still a teenager. Picasso was a precocious draftsman whose talent was already established before he... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/woman-at-home-in-many-worlds/33276/ Wed, 24 May 2006 00:00:00 EST Arielle Dombasle, star of the French cinema and a celebrated Parisian singer, likes to come to her native America from her home in France to do benefits for underprivileged children. "That, perhaps more than anything else, gives me great satisfaction," she said the other day during a quick visit to New York. "I like touching the heart with a language of its own - music." The latest of her music is captured in an album titled "Amor Amor," released by Wrasse Records. A collection of Mexican... PRANAY GUPTE http://www.nysun.com/new-york/he-knows-how-to-let-wine-and-shoes-breathe/33170/ Tue, 23 May 2006 00:00:00 EST Mario Moretti Polegato was born a vintner and became a shoemaker. "Cultivating vineyards and making wine was the family business," the founder and chief executive officer of Geox, one of the world's three biggest shoe companies, said. "But producing shoes is my mission." That mission has made him a billionaire and one of the wealthiest men in his native Italy, according to a 2006 list published by Forbes. Mr. Polegato said he isn't particularly awed by his membership in the very select club of...