September 15, 1999

COSI BREAKS BREAD - BREWS UP $40M DEAL WITH XANDO

Xando Coffee and Bar is getting cozy with Cosi Sandwich Bar. Two of the Big Apple's popular eateries and coffee bars agreed to merge in a $40 million deal that...

CNBC BUYS A PIECE OF ARCHIPELAGO ECN

CNBC expanded its cable network operations into the stock trading business yesterday, acquiring a 12.4 percent stake in the Archipelago trading network. The business-news network, owned by General Electric, staked...

JUDGE TOLD MERRILL DISCRIMINATION SETTLEMENT IS BULL

"I know dozens of women, including myself, who have not had their claims negotiated in good faith by Merrill Lynch." A former Merrill Lynch employee A group of outraged female...

SAFRA'S DOWN $320M BUT NOT OUT OF BID

Republic Bank of New York's billionaire founder Edmond Safra has seen his personal fortune drop over $320 million, as the bank's stock tumbles amid concern that a $10.3 billion takeover...

MARTHA'S CFO TRIES ON BIKINI

Martha Stewart is losing her chief financial officer to the beach - the virtual beach, that is. Barry Pincus is leaving Stewart's domestic juggernaut to become the CFO at Silicon...

FORTUNE ICES STARMEDIA'S CHEN FOR CANADIANS

Silicon Alley bigwig Jack Chen is probably ripping up his Fortune subscription. The president of Internet startup StarMedia Network was peeved not to make the magazine's list of "40 Wealthiest...

HE'S A SHOOTING STAR

TORONTO - The real star of the 24th annual Toronto Film Festival isn't an actor or a director but a Chinese cinematographer - a man named Zhao Fei, who may...

STILL NON-'STOP' FUN AFTER 15 YEARS

WHEN it was first released in 1984, Jonathan Demme's Talking Heads performance documentary "Stop Making Sense" was widely hailed as the greatest concert film ever made. With the possible exception...

THOSE FICKLE TEEN GIRLS SWING BACK TO SOAPS WITH A 'PASSION'

FEMALE teens are flocking to NBC's new soap, "Passions" in record numbers. Continuing a trend that started in prime time - with shows like "Dawson's Creek," "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"...

TV TICKER

Judgment day "Judge Judy" got off to a strong start Monday on its new home, Ch.4. "Judy" - which moved over from Ch.2 - notched an 8.1 rating (552,000 households)...

THIS 'MAME' IS LAME

THE sets are lavish, the costumes gaudy, the performers game. Why, then, is "Mame," now being revived at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, N.J., so lame? The problem is...

SIMPLY SEXY, SIMPLY FAB

A BRISK fall wind provided most of the soundtrack for John Bartlett's show, inspiring his A-list models to whisk themselves down the runway so quickly it was hard to see...

SOCIALITES DRESS UP DE LA RENTA SHOW

FORGET celebrities: Oscar de la Renta's show provided Fashion Week's best socialite eye candy so far, including Nan Kempner, Brooke Astor, Blaine Trump, C.Z. and Cornelia Guest and junior members...

WASHED AND WEARABLE

YEOHLEE's spring 2000 collection is pretty and practical - and hey, she even test-washed her fabrics in Woolite. At times, the separates bordered on dowdiness. (Something labeled "Puritan navy Teflon...

CHEAP EATS: UGUALE

Uguale 369 West St. (212) 229-0606 WHEN a restaurant sets up shop in an out-of-the-way location, they have to go that extra mile to get customers to go the distance....

BOCHCO IN 'BLUE' MOOD

THE new fall season has spawned cop-show creator Steven Bochco's latest project: "NYPD Sue" Bocho has slapped 20th Century Fox - which owns the show's distribution rights - with a...

WORTH THE RISQUE - 'ACTION' TAKES IT %#@*!!! LIMIT

"Action" Tomorrow 9:30 p.m. on WNYW/Ch. 5 THE funniest new comedy of the season is also going to be the biggest lightning rod. "Action" is not going to waste its...

FBI AGAIN LETS INS TAP ITS DATABASE

WASHINGTON - Immigration inspectors at JFK and Newark airports will again be able weed out foreign criminals by using FBI computers - after the FBI backed down from a six-month...

AFTER THE FALN, WHY NOT POLLARD? - WASHINGTON SHOULD PROVE HE DID AS MUCH DAMAGE AS IT CLAIMS

'There is strong evidence that the Justice Department violated its plea-bargain agreement with Pollard. After the FALN, Why Not Pollard?' NOW that Bill Clinton has significantly lowered the bar on...

READERS PLEAD: KEEP HER OUR IDEAL!

Please don't change, Miss America! That's the overwhelming sentiment of Post readers who flooded us with faxes and e-mails yesterday. Ninety percent of the readers were against allowing contestants who...

BUDDY OF BIN LADEN TIED TO MOSCOW BLASTS

A one-eyed Chechen warlord with long-standing ties to terrorist financier Osama bin Laden is suspected of masterminding the bloody apartment bombings in Moscow. Russian law-enforcement officials and U.S. counterterrorism experts...

NASA'S SHUTTLE FLEET AT MOTHER NATURE'S MERCY

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - A skeleton NASA crew - left behind at Cape Canaveral to tough out Hurricane Floyd - is hoping Mother Nature won't demolish America's $9 billion space-shuttle...

LIZA EYES BIG B'WAY COMEBACK; POST EXCLUSIVE

It will likely open Dec. 1 at the Palace Theatre, where Judy Garland staged a famous comeback concert in 1967. Liza Minnelli is planning to make a comeback with a...

WALL ST. HOTHEAD QUIZZED IN SLAY OF RUSSIAN MODEL

A onetime rising star at a prominent investment banking firm - fired for having a torrid affair with a female staffer - was grilled by cops last week after the...

NEW SMOKING LAWS MAY BE A REAL PAIN IN THE ASH

It could be a lot tougher to grab a smoke in New York City, under sweeping new proposals that would ban smoking just about everywhere - including bars and private...

TIMES SQ. PAVES WAY FOR Y2K

Times Square's beat-up streets are getting a face lift for the new millennium. The city Department of Transportation has begun repaving the streets in Times Square late at night and...

NEWT SWEETIE MAY FACE TAPED GRILLING ON THEIR AFFAIR

Questions could recall queries asked of President Clinton about his affair with Monica Lewinsky. WASHINGTON - Ex-House Speaker Newt Gingrich's girlfriend still faces sworn questions - likely on video -...

INDONESIA LEAVING TIMOR IN RUINS: ACTIVIST

"This is like World War II in the wake of wherever Nazi Germany went through." JOSE RAMOS-HORTA Indonesia troops are laying waste to East Timor in the days before international...

SHE SWEARS THERE'S NOTHING SHADY ABOUT HER HOME LOAN

"Everything that we've done has been passed on by the Office of Government Ethics." HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton yesterday defended herself against charges the financing for...

TEAM RUDY READY IF FLOYD POURS IT ON HERE

City officials yesterday began dusting off emergency plans for Hurricane Floyd, which could sweep across New York's shorefront as early as tomorrow night. "It's unclear now whether it will come...

UNION TO GOV: HEALTH $$ WILL WIN SUPPORT; EXCLUSIVE

The head of the powerful state health-care workers union yesterday urged Gov. Pataki to back more funding for the medically uninsured, saying he wants to "establish a better working relationship"...

ECOLOGY GROUP TWEAKS GORE BY BACKING BRADLEY

WASHINGTON - Vice President Al Gore - who bills himself as Mr. Environment - got a big slap yesterday from a top advocacy group, Friends of the Earth, which backed...

TOURISTS WATCH THEIR PLANS FOR TRAVEL UNRAVEL

Floyd, the howling hurricane that scared even mighty Mickey and forced the House of the Mouse to close, has thrown tourists into a tizzy. Wannabe vacationers dreaming of Florida, the...

COMPANY HAS HISTORY OF NOT MAKING THE GRADE

This is not the first time that CTB/McGraw-Hill's errors have sent school systems reeling. Similar snafus hit schools in Indiana and Tennessee. In the fall of 1998, officials at CTB/McGraw-Hill...

SPRAY KILLED 90% OF MOSQUITOES: RUDY

Mayor Giuliani claimed yesterday the city has destroyed about 90 percent of the local mosquito population in its war against the deadly St. Louis encephalitis virus. The first round of...

DUFF'S LEGAL EAGLES HAVE CLAWED AT EACH OTHER

Patricia Duff apparently believes the enemy of her lawyer should be her lawyer. In a surprise move, the multimillionaire mom revealed yesterday that she's hired two more lawyers - including...

SENATE DAMNS BILL, 95-2, FOR FALN OFFER

The Senate yesterday voted 95-2 to condemn President Clinton's clemency to 16 Puerto Rican militants - as the White House stonewalled questions on how the decision was made. Sen. Charles...

SCHOOLKIDS SUFFER AS FIRM BOTCHES TEST SCORES

Thousands of city kids may have been sent to summer school or denied promotion unfairly because a test publisher goofed in scoring exams, the Board of Education said yesterday. The...

PARENTS STUNG BY BLUNDER

Parents were shocked and angry yesterday to learn about the scoring slip-up on citywide reading and math tests. "How could they have messed up like this? Aren't they doing their...

HOUSE TARGETS LOW-COST 'AIR HILLARY' - WANTS HER TO PAY FULL FARE ON GOV'T JETS

WASHINGTON - The House yesterday voted decisively - as part of a campaign-finance reform bill - to make Hillary Rodham Clinton pay the full cost when she uses Uncle Sam's...

MILLIONS FLEEING STORM'S WRATH - RESIDENTS, TOURISTS IN MAD DASH

From central Florida to the Carolinas, furious Floyd yesterday sent nearly 2 million coastal residents and late-summer tourists packing in the calm before the storm. Highways were bumper-to-bumper, hotels were...

BABY BORN AT S.I. TOLL PLAZA

It was anything but anE-ZPass yesterday for a 24-year-old woman who gave birth at the Outerbridge Crossing yesterday with the aid of two Port Authority cops. Maribel Adames, 24, went...

SONGBIRD SHERYL FLIES HIGH WITH HER FRIENDS

MOST summer nights, there's no place like Central Park to see stars. But sometimes, like last night, it's superstars that shine brilliantly there. Sheryl Crow, who became a citizen of...

'DIVORCED' MISS AMERICA PLAN FACES ANNULMENT

Miss America pageant officials made a dramatic flip-flop yesterday - saying they might quash new rules that would allow women who've been divorced or who've had abortions to compete. The...

CROW TENDS A HAPPY FLOCK IN CENTRAL PK.

Frenzied fans of Sheryl Crow flocked to rock at Central Park last night for the sexy songstress' free concert - saying all they wanna do is have some fun. They...

HUGE 'CANE STORMS SOUTHWEST COAST - 140-MPH WINDS RAVAGE BAHAMAS

Here comes ferocious Floyd. The monstrous, 600-mile storm is gearing up to rake the coasts of Florida and Georgia late this morning with fierce winds as it heads for landfall,...

RIDERS TELL TA WORKERS LOUD & CLEAR: SPEAK UP!

Straphangers are delivering a loud message to train conductors and bus drivers: "Speak up! We can't hear you!" Train announcements can't be heard in 39 percent of subway cars, a...

PA COPS HELP MOM IN LABOR AS BIRTH TAKES TOLL

It was anything but an E-ZPass yesterday for a 24-year-old woman who gave birth - with the help of two Port Authority cops - at the Staten Island toll plaza...

FISHERMEN ANGLING TO KEEP MORE BLUES

DESPITE an abundance of bluefish along the Atlantic Coast, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission and the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council are refusing to hear motions to increase from 10...

PEDERSON MAY KEEP WINGIN' IT

It wasn't the answer Denis Pederson wants. The Devils' 1993 first-rounder was pressed into regular right wing duty last season. He doesn't want it to happen again. "I'm a centerman....

DEFENSE MUST SAVE JETS NOW; GANG GREEN NEEDS DEFENSE TO LEAD THE WAY

THIS is a call to the Jets' defense to hit an immediate stride, beginning with a calculated, dominating, nasty statement Sunday night in Buffalo. Practically every corner of the free...

TOO SOON TO BEAT UP ON BIG BLUE OFFENSE

A VICTORY is supposed to fuel the fire and quiet the critics, but it did not work that way for the Giants. They did what few believed they could or...

RAIN, BIG WEEKEND ON TAP

With the Nov. 6 Breeders' Cup at Gulfstream Park just 7 weeks away, some of the biggest races of the year are on tap at Belmont Park this weekend as...

ESA PICKS FIGHT WITH BLUESHIRTS

Esa Tikkanen has filed a grievance with the NHLPA against the Rangers that will be heard by an arbitrator, The Post has learned. The winger, currently in Edmonton's training camp...

EX-RANGERS LOVING IT WITH ISLES

Unable to make it with the King-of-the-Hill Rangers, Eric Cairns and Chris Ferraro want to make a brand new start of it, Long Island, Long Island. The former Broadway Blues...

SURGERY DELAYS JAYSON - NETS SIGN FORWARD CAGE FOR INSURANCE

"It's likely Jayson's not going to be able to play at the beginning of the season." JOHN NASH Just like with the center on the other side of the Hudson...

TRINIDAD AT CROSSROADS

LAS VEGAS - There is a great story somewhere inside Felix Trinidad, but good luck trying to get him to tell it. Not this week at least, and unless he...

OSCAR-FELIX: WAR FOR AGES - DE LA HOYA-TRINIDAD SHOWDOWN SHAPES UP AS ALL-TIME CLASSIC

LAS VEGAS -Welcome to the brave new world of cyberboxing. What used to be in-your-face is now interfaced. And Felix Trinidad has gotten into Oscar De La Hoya's in a...

FREE AGENT SCHAYES EYEING KNICKS

With Patrick Ewing's frightening admission that he's unsure when he'll be able to run again because of recurring tendinitis and Chris Dudley (knee sprain) out until at least the second...

BROSIUS LEAVES EARLY TO BE WITH FAMILY

YANKEE NOTES TORONTO - When Joe Torre arrived at his SkyDome office yesterday afternoon he was greeted by Scott Brosius, who informed Torre that he needed to go home to...

COULD BE FIRST FIGHT IN A SERIES

LAS VEGAS - As a mariachi band played, Oscar De La Hoya made his grand arrival last night at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino for Saturday's titanic bout with...

FEELIN' JUST GRAND - SLAMS BY BERNIE, O'NEILL PUMP LIFE BACK INTO YANKS

TORONTO - The biggest win of the Yankees' season was fueled by Bernie Williams and Paul O'Neill, a pair of frigid hitters, coming through with dramatic, late-game grand slams. However,...

BOMBERS GET BOOST FROM DEPTH CHARGE

TORONTO - Did Bernie Williams go deep? Only to the depths of his soul. The Yankees were so low, even Jules Verne couldn't have found them. They were with the...

BOMBERS NEED CONE TO BE STOPPER AGAIN

TORONTO - There is barely enough room left to the Yankees' American League East lead to swing a cat, which makes it the perfect venue for David Cone to scratch...