Bill Thompson continues to oppose changing the term-limits law, and is out with a statement criticizing the City Council for moving ahead with Michael Bloomberg's plan. This time he doesn't name names.

Thompson said:

Today, the New York City Council introduced two measures, one that would allow the Council and the Mayor to single-handedly grant themselves the ability to run for a third term. The other measure would allow New York City voters to make the decision.

The choice is clear: People must come before politics. It is inappropriate for the Mayor and City Council to pass legislation that ignores the will of the voters. A government should serve its people and not itself. New Yorkers deserve nothing less.

The fashion world has recently become fascinated with superheroes of the Batman, Spiderman, and Superman variety. This year the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art chose a superhero theme for its annual gala; Anna Wintour wore a silver Chanel extraterrestrial gown. Even socialite Denise Wohl, mother of Arden, started a comic book company, Intrinsic Comics, last year with former Marvel Comics Editor-in-Chief James Shooter. 

Now designer Diane von Furstenberg is getting ready to launch her holiday collection inspired by Wonder Woman, perhaps hoping that superheroes will bring the same kind of sales to a clothing line as they did to feature films. She's even authored a comic book, “Be the Wonder Woman You Can Be, Featuring the Adventures of Diva, Viva & Fifa," illustrated by artist Konstantin Kakanias. The comic will feature inspirational stories about three women as they discover their "inner Wonder Woman," all while wearing DVF designs.   read more »

That was the average New York City home sales price in the third quarter, according to a new report from the Real Estate Board of New York. That's down from the last two quarters but up slightly from the same period in 2007.  read more »

The Bloomberg administration has designated a team led by Chicago-based developer General Growth Properties and Archstone Smith to construct a 1.7 million-square-foot mixed-use, mixed-income complex on East 125th Street, the city announced today.

The selection was coupled with a vote on the project by the City Council, which this afternoon approved a rezoning of the site that runs from 125th Street to 127th Street, between Second and Third avenues.

Developer General Growth--which is a leader on a team that includes Archstone-Smith, the Richman Group, Monadnock Construction, the Carey Group, Hope Community and El Barrio's Operation Fightback--faces financial troubles nationally.  read more »

These are bleak economic times. Everyone who's not listening to John McCain and Sarah Palin talking about Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright knows that. But amid bank closings, job losses, and belt-tightening, there's one field that's experiencing a bump.

We're speaking, of course, of stock photography from the Great Depression. Photo agencies like Getty Images, Corbis, The Associated Press, and others seem to be doing just fine if recent press clippings are any indication.

Let's just hope this isn't a bubble.  read more »

Okay, we don't want to get our hopes up....but this Tim Burton-directed Alice in Wonderland which will combine live action with performance-capture "technology" (meep!) is beginning to sound kinda awesome. In addition to Mia Wasikowska (from HBO's In Treatment) being cast as Alice, and Johnny Depp signing on as the Mad Hatter, The Hollywood Reporter reports today that Anne Hathaway, fresh off all her good reviews for Rachel Getting Married, has signed on to play the White Queen while Helena Bonham Carter will play the Red Queen. Good for Anne Hathaway! Not only has she handled a difficult time in her personal life with grace and aplomb in interviews, but she's doing the smartest thing possible: making good movies for people to talk about instead (it worked for Nicole Kidman, too). As for Mr. Burton's new production, we eagerly await casting news on who will play the Cheshire Cat. Is Jack Nicholson available?

So you're single in New York. You come home late after a few beers on a Friday night, check your email and find a bunch of spam. Your recent ex just wrote a new status update on her Facebook page, broadcasting how awesome the single life is before your new "relationship status" has dropped below the news feed page. And maybe you start drafting a drunken email message to the ex. Some of us have been there... and so has Gmail Engineer Jon Perlow.

"Sometimes I send messages I shouldn't send. Like the time I told that girl I had a crush on her over text message. Or the time I sent that late night email to my ex-girlfriend that we should get back together." But Mr. Perlow has come up with a solution : Mail Goggles. "Gmail can't always prevent you from sending messages you might later regret, but today we're launching a new Labs feature I wrote called Mail Goggles which may help," he wrote on the Official Gmail Blog yesterday.  read more »

Far be it for me to condone the Kenyan government’s heavy-handed treatment of anti-Obama polemicist Jerome Corsi, news of which was splashed across the top of the Drudge Report this morning, and is still prominently displayed. As a reporter who has spent some time in the region, Corsi’s deportation—if that is indeed what happened—appears to be an all-too-familiar case of an annoyed government overreacting in stereotypical fashion. On the other hand, no one should portray Corsi as a martyr for press freedom. What he was up to in Kenya wasn’t journalism. It was a dangerous political stunt.

First, some background.  read more »

There will be two public hearings at City Hall on the legislation to change term limits, at 3 p.m. on October 16 and another at 10 a.m. on October 17.

That was the biggest news to come out of Christine Quinn's press conference in the Red Room of City Hall, which took place a few minutes ago and was carried live on NY1, after she once again declined to take a clear stance on Michael Bloomberg's plan to extend term limits from two to three.

Quinn told the room full of reporters she wouldn't be taking a position yet, and instead, spoke about bills being introduced in the Council today that deal with housing and land-use issues.  read more »

As if the blog world weren't bleak enough with layoffs and a few well-compensated sites hoarding traffic and precious memes, now mainstream media outlets are chipping away at bloggers' quotas by doing their posts for them.

Esquire's Web site has a feature about the making of its current cover, which features Halle Berry posed like Bill Clinton from the magazine's December 2000 issue.

First, Esquire juxtaposes the two Platon-shot covers so readers can see how similar they are, which everyone knows is a staple of bloggers the world over. (Media Mob takes this personally.)  read more »