Carrie Cracknell’s ‘A Doll’s House’ restores Ibsen’s power

It takes only minutes for this outstanding production of "A Doll's House" to grab you — and that's before a word of Ibsen's 1879 classic about an increasingly desperate housewife is spoken.

For this London import, director Carrie Cracknell placed the home of our heroine, Nora, on a giant turntable. As Ian MacNeil's set slowly revolves in the opening scene, we discover the various rooms and their inhabitants. Nora (Hattie Morahan) breezes in, loaded with packages. She banters with the maid and stuffs her mouth with chocolates.

But when her husband, Torvald (Dominic Rowan), calls from his den, she looks guilt-stricken and chokes them down, like a kid caught doing something naughty. And, sure enough, that's how her husband treats her, down to calling her by condescending little pet names.

Nora has bigger issues than sweets, though, and hides a cumbersome secret from her husband — even though it's something she did for his sake. A suspense worthy of Hitchcock sets in: Will she be found out? How's Mr. Man going to react?

As a proper wife and mother, Nora must always keep up cheery appearances. But she can't ever escape scrutiny: Thanks to the moving set, we can see her no matter where she goes.

The evening zips by, Ibsen's peerless dramatic wheels oiled by a smooth new adaptation by Simon Stephens, whose play "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" hits Broadway this fall. The production also boasts superb period costumes by Gabrielle Dalton and a superb ensemble. Rowan, in particular, makes us understand that Torvald doesn't mean ill — he's simply the product of his environment.

But it's Morahan's extraordinary performance that holds the show together.

Nora is usually portrayed as spoiled, manipulative and neurotic, and her eventual break from Torvald feels like a stretch. Morahan's Nora naturally inches toward awakening, and her final revolt makes total sense.

"I think I'm a human being before anything else," she tells her stunned hubby. "I don't care what other people say. I don't care what people write in books. I need to think for myself."

Amen, sister!

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Mormons say faithful aren’t taught they get their own planets

SALT LAKE CITY — The Mormon Church is pushing back against the notion that members of the faith are taught they'll get their own planet in the afterlife, a misconception popularized in pop culture most recently by the Broadway show "The Book of Mormon."

A newly-posted article affirms the faith's belief that humans can become like God in eternity, but says the "cartoonish image of people receiving their own planets" is not how members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints envision it.

"While few Latter-day Saints would identify with caricatures of having their own planet, most would agree that the awe inspired by creation hints at our creative potential in the eternities," the article says.

The expectation of exaltation is more figurative and ambiguous than boiling it down to living on one planet, it says.

"Church members imagine exaltation less through images of what they will get and more through the relationships they have now and how those relationships might be purified and elevated," the article says.

The 3,500-word article is part of a series of recent online pieces posted on the church website that explain, expand or clarify on some of the more sensitive gospel topics.

Past articles have addressed the faith's past ban on black men in the lay clergy and the early history of polygamy.

The series of postings have been applauded by religious scholars who say the church is finally acknowledging some of the most controversial or sensitive parts of its history and doctrine that it once sidestepped.

"The church has become fully aware that scholarship and history is a double edge sword," said Terryl Givens, professor of literature and religion and the James Bostwick Chair of English at the University of Richmond. "They can work in the church's favor, but they can also be unsettling."

The new article, entitled "Becoming Like God," doesn't mention Kolob, referred to in the Book of Abraham as a planet or star closest to the throne of God.

Kolob is mentioned in a Mormon hymn, but interpretations that it is the planet where God lives, or the place where church members will go when they die, read a great deal into an obscure verse in Mormon scripture, said Matthew Bowman, assistant professor of religion at Hampden-Sydney College.

"I'm not surprised it's not mentioned," Bowman said. "Even most Mormons aren't sure what exactly to make of the reference."

Kolob is believed to be the inspiration for the name of the planet, "Kobol," in the science fiction TV series "Battlestar Galactica," which was created by a Mormon.

Kolob is also mentioned in the Broadway show "The Book of Mormon" when a fictional Mormon missionary sings about all the things he believes as a church member.

"I believe that God has a plan for all of us. I believe that plan involved me getting my own planet," he bellows, and later, "I believe that God lives on a planet called Kolob."

People commonly latch on to the most outrageous or unique aspects of religions, such as Amish people using horse and buggy, and that's how the perception of Mormons inheriting their own planets became widespread, Givens said.

The series of postings, as well as the church's opening of its archive, shows a natural progression for a religion that is younger than other major worldwide faiths, Givens said. The church was founded in 1830 and took more than a century to hit 1 million members. Today, there are 15 million Mormons worldwide.

"Many of these things can be unsettling to members who have grown up with a typically manicured narrative, but it's a necessary part of the maturation for the church membership," Givens said.

The intent of the articles is to give Mormons and non-Mormons definitive places to go to study or learn about doctrinal issues. That could happen eventually but church leaders need to make people aware of them, said Armand Mauss, a retired professor of sociology and religious studies at Washington State University.

And he said the article won't put an end to misconceptions held by some about Mormons.

"For devout members of other Christian denominations, especially those of the Evangelical variety, this statement will confirm their existing claims of outrageous Mormon heresies where doctrines of deity are concerned," Mauss said.

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Bill goes ugly

In cheering the mayor's decision to take away space promised to three charter schools run by Eva Moskowitz — leaving hundreds of children without a school for next year — Bill de Blasio ally Bertha Lewis hailed it as justice: "Eva Moskowitz got away with murder for so long."

Telling words indeed. Because what Eva Moskowitz "got away with" for so long was proving there are public schools in this city where black and Latino children learn and achieve. They are called charters.

You see, Eva's public schools are based on excellence. Take Success Academy Harlem Central, one of the three Moskowitz-run schools targeted by de Blasio.

Ninety-seven percent of its students are children of color. Not only is it Harlem's best middle school, last year its fifth graders ranked tops in the state for math. Here's their reward: 210 students have just found themselves school-less for next year, with the local public alternatives being some of the lowest-performing middle schools in the state.

By targeting the public schools run by Moskowitz, the mayor clearly hopes to split the charter movement. But in so choosing, he revealed his true colors. Because he did not target one of the mediocre charters. Nor did he pretend he was taking away space from Eva's kids because they weren't learning.

To the contrary: De Blasio is taking the space away because these kids are learning. That's a huge embarrassment to a mayor and his union allies who spend their time excusing public school failure rather than redressing it. So he's taking it out on the kids. How nasty is that?

Imagine you are a single mom with a so-so job, an apartment in an iffy area and not much money. But your daughter is at a Harlem Success Academy, and you are happy because she is in a good school where she is learning and on the path to go to high school and college.

Now imagine the mayor has just pulled this rug out from under you, leaving your daughter to choose from schools that are all much worse than what she now has.

Gov. Cuomo, these kids need you.

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Casino advantage

We've long been dubious about casinos — especially when promoted on the grounds that they will revitalize economically depressed upstate areas.

We now we have new reason for skepticism: Turns out the casinos may not be built in the areas they are supposed to help.

For four decades, Sullivan and Ulster counties have been pushing for casinos, citing the region's chronic high unemployment and general economic malaise. When state voters approved a constitutional amendment permitting expanded gambling last November, local officials were overjoyed, since the Catskills are set to get two of the seven new facilities.

But despite Gov. Cuomo's pledge that casinos would be located "where we need [them] most," at least some developers have their eye on Orange County.

Orange is much better off economically than Sullivan County. More important, it's much closer to New York City — from which casinos hope to attract customers — than either Sullivan or Ulster counties.

One developer who hopes to put a casino into the old Nevele Hotel in Ulster County put it this way to The New York Times: "Why would anyone feel the need to go further? It would take southern Ulster County and Sullivan County out of contention."

Our view has always been that gambling is a tax on the poor that brings many social ills along with its jobs. As for revitalizing towns and neighborhoods, Atlantic City is Exhibit A against that argument.

Given all the problems and overpromises associated with casinos, we wouldn't be surprised if it ends up that not getting one proves to be the better bet.

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A cop-killer’s flack

As director of litigation for the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund, Debo Adegbile put himself at the center of a public campaign on behalf of convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal. Now President Obama has nominated this man to head the civil-rights division at the Justice Department.

And all that stands between Adegbile and his appointment is a Senate confirmation.

Let's start at the beginning. In 1981, Abu-Jamal murdered Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner. The evidence against him was overwhelming. He was convicted and sentenced to death.

The facts have never really been in doubt. But the left painted Abu-Jamal as the victim of a racist justice system, and over the course of three decades of appeals he became a cause célèbre. He delivered (via a recording) a commencement address for Antioch College. National Public Radio enlisted him for commentaries on crime. Paris declared him an honorary citizen.

In 2009, the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund decided to get in on the act. This meant more than simply legal representation (which Abu-Jamal already had). It meant orchestrating a public campaign impugning the justice system.

We suspect even the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee who voted for Adebgile's nomination to proceed are uncomfortable with this record. Why else would they have prevented the widow of the slain police officer, Maureen Faulkner, from testifying before the committee?

Let's hope the Senate does not compound one injustice with another by confirming this man to head a division touted as "the conscience of the federal government."

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Funds underperform, but hedge fund kings rake in $24.3 billion

Hedge-fund titans are still the kings of Wall Street.

Last year, the top 25 hedge-fund earners pulled down $24.3 billion, up about 50 percent from 2012, according to a report Wednesday.

The mouth-watering moolah poured in while most hedge funds in 2013 underperformed the broader markets.

But that didn't stop six men from earning more than $1 billion, according to the report in Forbes. The group includes Steve Cohen, founder of the besieged SAC Capital.

George Soros, the 83-year-old retired hedgie superstar whose fund has been around for 40 years, and who is now managing his family's wealth, earned $4 billion — matching the record-high earnings that David Tepper, of Appaloosa Management, took home in 2009.

And speaking of Tepper, the 56-year-old investor earned $3.5 billion in 2013, which comes out to roughly $1.5 million an hour based on a 50-hour workweek and four weeks of vacation.

Since Soros is retired, he makes money just breathing — about $457,000 every hour he is alive.

Hedgies also continue to far out-earn their peers in the private-equity world. The top-earning head of a publicly traded p.r. firm in 2013 was Leon Black of Apollo Global Management, who earned $369 million, according to a report from Bloomberg News.

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Facebook tries to woo advertisers away from TV

Facebook highlighted on Wednesday two advertising campaigns in an attempt to persuade advertisers that its massive membership base and ability to hone in on specific audiences makes it a more effective advertising platform than broadcast TV.

The No. 1 social network revealed in a blog post details about marketing campaigns from the American Association of Retired People and the American Legacy Foundation to show how Facebook can target specific age groups among its audience of more than 1 billion global users, which rivals the number of people watching TV.

Television has long gotten the lion's share of ad dollars, with more than $66 billion in 2013 in the US alone, according to eMarketer. Facebook generated roughly $7 billion in global ad revenue during the same year.

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Dream Homes

$17.4 million | 177 E. 71st St.

A three-year nip/tuck has transformed this 20-foot-wide, eight-bedroom, six-bathroom, 6,700-square-foot red brick Neo-Federal townhouse into modern greatness, while preserving its early 20th-century charms. It boasts a home theater, six woodburning fireplaces and a basement larger than most city dweller's dwellings — at 1,600 square feet. Outside, there are gardens galore — one in the backyard, and one on the roof. Agent: Samuel Thomas Milbank, Brown Harris Stevens, 212-906-9248

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Photo: Richard Caplan

$5 million | 131 W. 24th St.

Going up? You bet you are, using the private elevator in this five-bedroom, three-bathroom duplex loft. The central living room has 18-foot, 9-inch ceilings and opens to several multi-use areas. The kitchen is surprisingly "unpretentious," so no shame in nuking a jar of Tostitos cheese dip while you enjoy all that natural light flooding in. The bathrooms are Zen-sational: Jacuzzi tubs and all. There's also a double-height projection screen for mandatory movie nights. Agents: Adie Kriegstein and Patrick Lillly, Core, 212-612-9681 and 917-921-6929

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Photo: Michael Weinstein

$6.25 million | 16 Desbrosses St.

Architect David Bers has infused this condo with warmth, white walls and welcome coziness. The "sprawling" duplex residence, plus a small duplex studio across the hall, add up to 3,600 square feet; it's currently a two-bedroom but is convertible to four. If you don't know how to cook, you're going to want to learn: In the kitchen there's a six-burner Wolf Stove with griddle and double oven. It also comes a storage room in the cellar. Agent: Terry Naini, Town, 917-841-1826

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Herbalife donated money to 5 supportive Hispanic groups

Herbalife recently donated money to five of the seven Hispanic groups that signed a letter last week supporting the company, The Post has learned.

The donations were not disclosed and were only admitted by Herbalife after a reporter contacted three of the groups on Wednesday.

The "Friends of Herbalife" letter was sent to Washington lawmakers 10 days after 16 consumer and Hispanic groups asked regulators and congressional reps to start a probe of the LA company.

Reps of the three Hispanic organizations — the National Puerto Rican Coalition, the National Hispana Leadership Institute and the Hispanic Heritage Foundation — each said Herbalife recently gave them money in the form of corporate sponsorships.

The dissenters maintain the company is a pyramid scheme that targets Latinos and other vulnerable communities "with false promises of wealth and success."

Herbalife denies those allegations and said it contributes to nonprofit organizations "openly and transparently."

Late Wednesday, Herbalife confirmed that it had given money to five of the seven groups, but didn't name them.

Ralph Fantauzzi, president and CEO of the NPRC, said his group got $25,000 from Herbalife last fall. He earlier met with reps of Bill Ackman's Pershing Square.

Ackman got the Herbalife debate started with a $1 billion short bet on Herbalife 14 months ago.

Fantauzzi's position has put him at odds with a pal, Brent Wilkes, the executive director of the League of United Latin American Citizens, who has galvanized the community support against the company.

Wilkes said Herbalife offered his group money last summer, days before he was scheduled to meet with Washington regulators. He turned it down, he said.

Of particular concern to LULAC was Herbalife's acknowledgment that 88 percent of its distributors earned nothing in 2012. Antonio Tijerio's Hispanic Heritage, which got between $50,000 and $100,000 in sponsor money from the company, said he was unaware of that statistic.

Ackman's Pershing Square has disclosed that it made a single $10,000 donation to only one of the 16 dissenting groups, Make the Way New York. The money was used, the hedge fund said, to defray costs of a "victim identification survey."

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Irish eyes are smiling

Count the New York City Council "out" — of the St. Patrick's Day Parade, that is.

This week, Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, announced the council will not have an "official presence" at next month's annual parade up Fifth Avenue.

But, she added, "individual council members can still be able to participate if they wish." In so deciding, the speaker follows the mayor's lead, who has declined to march himself but refused to ban uniformed city workers from marching.

New York's annual St. Patrick's Day Parade ranks among the nation's oldest, dating back to 1762. It's privately run, and in recent years has come under attack because it has a policy that precludes participants from marching under banners that identify themselves as gay. In 1995, the Supreme Court upheld the parade's First Amendment right to do so.

Mark-Viverito explains her opposition this way: "The St. Patrick's Parade should be a time when all New Yorkers can come together and march openly as who they are — but right now that is not the case for the LGBT community."

How ironic that in a city that prides itself on diversity, one parade is singled out because it wishes to celebrate its individual values in its own way, just as the Gay Pride Parade in June does.

The organizers of the St. Patrick's Day Parade say gays are free to march — just not with banners or signs identifying them as gay, because that's inimical to the ­message they wish to send on a day commemorating an Irish saint.

Mark-Viverito likewise says council members are free to march — just so long as there is no council banner or Sergeant-at-Arms present, on the grounds this would be inimical to the message the council wants to send.

We congratulate our progressive speaker for showing just how reasonable the St. Patrick's Day Parade organizers are by adopting the same approach they've taken.

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Mayor cuffed by his own crusade

One problem with getting yourself arrested for a principle is that you wind up stuck with a record.

So it was with Bill de Blasio, who accepted plastic wrist restraints on behalf of Long Island College Hospital last summer — and so acquired full moral responsibility for New York City's bewilderingly opaque, quietly collapsing hospital system.

It's far from clear whether the mayor is up to that challenge, but he's certainly not bashful about burrowing further into the hole he's already dug.

LICH is a 150-plus-year-old full-service hospital in Brooklyn's gentrified Cobble Hill neighborhood; it's been on shaky financial footing for decades — a condition common to hospitals across the five boroughs.

The State University of New York bought LICH in 2009. Big mistake: "This has been very costly for us," says H. Carl McCall, chairman of SUNY's board of trustees and a master of understatement — for "costly" scarcely describes it.

LICH has burned through more than $100 million of SUNY funds since last summer alone. SUNY has been trying to peddle it almost from Day One — attracting real-estate developers in profusion, but nobody interested in running a traditional community-based hospital.

Which isn't surprising, since tradition doesn't count for much when it comes to hospital finance. The system has too many empty beds, far too much staff for the patient load and not enough money — and this is not news.

Meanwhile, nothing attracts the usual suspects more quickly — or thickly — than a real-estate developer. This explains how then-long-shot mayoral candidate de Blasio came to be arrested in front of LICH last July, "protesting" its impending closure.

The hospital was de Blasio's red line. The handcuffs solidified hard-left union support, raised his profile substantially and arguably set him on a path to the mayoralty.

This did not, however, solve the hospital's problems — nor SUNY's, which was losing some $13 million a month when de Blasio took office.

So what's a new mayor to do?

Declare victory and move on? Not The Blaz. Not last Friday, during one of his most contentious press briefings yet.

McCall, SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher and Gov. Cuomo had colluded (in the best sense of the word) to give de Blasio the deal everybody could have had last summer: Sale of the LICH to a developer to be named later, some subsidized housing, an on-site health-care facility of some sort — and, it seems, a little baksheesh for the boys and girls.

That is, while there's no hospital hard-wired into the agreement, Public Advocate Letitia James and some "community groups" stand to collect several million dollars from the sale of the LICH site to fund a "health-care-related" not-for-profit.

Even that could vanish, if the deal falls through. It could evaporate in as little as three weeks ("It's not a settlement that is going to guarantee anything," said one lawyer working to keep the hospital open), but it still frees SUNY of LICH by the end of May.

So maybe de Blasio should've just said thank you and left it at that. Nope: He had to gild the lily.

The deal marked a "truly historic, transcendent moment," he said Friday — touting it as a template for saving other money-pit acute-care facilities, including Interfaith Hospital in Brooklyn and St. John's in Far Rockaway.

As if.

The harsh truth is that if the LICH deal has any staying power, it will be solely because of the real-estate money — at least $250 million, and maybe as much as $300 million, for the site in tony Cobble Hill.

Good luck matching that, Interfaith.

Indeed, good luck matching that, City Hall.

For, even as Advocate James and others spent Monday celebrating the LICH deal as a template for Interfaith  (again, it's not), the head of the city's Health & Hospitals Corp. was all but declaring bankruptcy before the City Council.

HHC President Alan Aviles, citing federal and state operating-aid cuts and "astronomical increases" in employee fringe-benefit costs, predicted an HHC operating deficit of some $1.4 billion a year by 2018. That's a big hole in Mayor de Blasio's budget.

HHC owns and operates 11 hospitals; it treated 1.4 million patients last year, 500,000 of whom had no health insurance. The city's privately owned facilities don't face as large an uninsured problem, but enough of one to threaten many a bottom line.

And that's not all that HHC and the privates have in common:

l Both have far too many empty beds — and thus far too much staff being paid to "serve" patients who aren't there, and so aren't bringing in dollars to cover those salaries.

l Neither has any reasonable hope of state or federal bailouts. (That $8 billion Medicaid "waiver" bonus that both de Blasio and Cuomo are touting doesn't amount to much in the context of New York's $56 billion-a-year Medicaid budget.)

l And neither has much in the way of real estate to sell.

The sooner some hospitals close, the faster their paying customers will move to the others — leaving them better able to survive. The longer the walking dead like LICH linger, the worse off everyone is.

But lacking is any evidence of the political will that is going to be necessary to move the mayor past a crisis he didn't create, but which he continues to exacerbate — and the bill for which is going to land on his desk.

Yes, the handcuffs arguably got him to where he is today. Now he needs to get out of them, and that's not going to be easy.

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New York & Company to move as part of Penn Plaza surge

Women's-apparel retailer New York & Co. signed a new lease and will move its headquarters to nearly 180,000 square feet in the Vornado Realty Trust building at 330 W. 34th St., The Post first reported on its website Tuesday.

The real-estate investment trust said a deal for the space had been signed Feb. 24 during its conference call, but did not disclose the tenant.

Sources later confirmed it is the 500-store apparel chain.

The fashion company has been based at nearby 450 W. 33rd St. for more than 20 years, since it was known as the Lerner Shops.

New York & Co. is now expected to move to the Vornado building by the end of 2014 after working out an agreement with the current building owner, Brookfield Properties, to leave six months early.

The retailer is taking the 6th through 9th floors that range in size from 43,100 to 45,650 square feet, along with another 5,000 square-foot space at a rent in the $50s per square foot, sources said.

The retailer is known for seasonal trends at value pricing with trendy collections, including one by the actress Eva Mendes.

Lerner Shops was founded in 1918 by Harold M. Lane and Samuel Lerner, the uncle of Alan Jay Lerner, the lyricist.

Vornado is completing a full renovation of the building as part of its efforts to upgrade its entire Penn Plaza portfolio. Because of the interest in Midtown South and the Hudson Yards,

"Everything is tilting toward the Penn Plaza District," Chief Executive Steve Roth said on the call.

Vornado also is renovating the Hotel Pennsylvania, which Roth called "the single most important focus of our portfolio," disclosing efforts to upgrade its lobby, restaurants and nightlife.

New York & Co. was represented by a CBRE team of Steve Siegel, Ken Meyerson, Lauren Crowley Corrinet and Brendan Herlihy, along with independent consultants Doane Kelly and David Fleisher of KLG Advisors and Alan R. Grossman of ARG Realty Consultants.

Vornado was represented in-house by Craig Panzirer and Jared Silverman.

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The prestigious Harlem Academy will have an entirely new building designed by Rafael Vinoly on 20,000 square feet of vacant land it just purchased at 655 St. Nicholas Ave. for $9.5 million.

The school for high achievers intends to consolidate current sites at Fifth Avenue and 111th Street to develop a new school of 50,000 to 80,000 square feet.

The design is still being tweaked with its board member, architect Jay Bargmann of Vinoly, as the goal is to also have adjacent outdoor play areas.

The new building will let the school triple the number of students from 120 to 360 in grades K-8. Along with classrooms it will include a regulation gym, science labs, a cafeteria and performance hall.

Paul Wolf and Stephen Powers of Denham Wolf, who focus on nonprofits, led the 18-month search. They used GIS mapping to find large parcels and then sifted through more than 100 to find this off-market gem.

"They wanted to have a real campus," said Powers.

The deal was a flip by Mark Caller of The Marcal Group, who paid $5.5 million to the $4.4 million mortgage holder after it foreclosed when the garage owner filed for bankruptcy.

Powers said Caller tore down the vacant garage, conducted a complete environmental remediation and shored up the retaining wall holding up the adjacent Hamilton Terrace apartment buildings above, leaving it ready for development.

The school's average tuition is $2,000 per year. and it has been fund raising and gathering pledges to pay for the project, which used a $7.6 million bridge loan.

There are also expected to be a lot of synergies with the adjacent after-school programs at the Harlem School of the Arts when the Academy opens in about two years.

The purchase price would have been twice the amount if sold for housing use, the brokers said. Mayor de Blasio may not yet fully understand the city's assessed value (AV) issues, as he has proposed raising the AV on vacant sites to force developers to build faster.

The billable AV for the garage rose dramatically from $130,000 in 2000 for taxes of $13,000 per year, to an AV of $1,144,260 in 2008, making taxes $115,100 (and always paid late).

The AV was down to $679,097 for the 2013-14 tax year, so the Academy owes $36,747 for the quarter starting April 1. Some day, exemption paperwork will zero out its future bills.

The tentative billable AV starting July 1 will be $349,740, for yearly taxes of roughly $70,000. The Academy also owes $18.71 in back taxes on a 2.42 square foot by 119.5 square foot-long second parcel. Welcome to the wacky world of city tax assessment.

This site has also been on and off city lien sales since 1976 because the garage owners could not afford the taxes, its mortgage was foreclosed, and there was little demand for sites this size restricted to community use.

"It made it a very tricky property," said Powers.

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Johnson Controls is expanding and moving from the 41st floor of 12,000 square feet to the entire 17,000 square-foot 29th floor of 60 E. 42nd St.

Thomas Pulie of USI Real Estate Brokerage Services represented JCI, while William Cohen and Julie Christiano of Newmark Grubb Knight Frank and Ryan Kass, now in-house with the Empire State Realty Trust ownership. The asking rent was $52.50 per square foot.

JCI has also done extensive work on the ESRT-owned Empire State Building's energy renovations.

Monday, a state Appellate Court ruled against partnership interests that were bought out to create the real-estate investment trust that now owns both buildings.

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Target Newark

Another front in the war against stop-and-frisk opened across the Hudson this week in Newark. It reminds us that the damage federal Judge Shira Scheindlin did when she dishonored our police will not be limited to New York if her ruling is allowed to stand.

This new battle was launched by the American Civil Liberties Union — and it comes amid a Newark murder wave. While New York has had the fewest murders in 50 years, the 111 murders in Newark last year was the highest in two decades.

With all these bad guys out there killing people in Newark, naturally the ACLU has found its villain: the Newark Police Department. In a new report, the ACLU complains that while African Americans represent 57 percent of the city's population, they account for 75 percent of the police stops.

We've seen this script before. In New York, the activists used similar numbers to claim the cops were racist. As in Newark, Eric Holder's Department of Justice intervened on the side of the activists in New York. Ultimately, they found an anti-cop federal judge — Shira Scheindlin — who affirmed the charge in an outrageously biased court decision that declared stop-and-frisk unconstitutional.

The point is, we can already see how this will turn out for Newark, at least unless Scheindlin's ruling is tossed out and the case reheard. The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals has thrown Scheindlin's case back to the federeal district court on the grounds she lacked the appearance of impartiality.

Unfortunately, with Mayor de Blasio making clear the city won't appeal, the only hope now is if the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association is given standing to appeal Scheindlin's ruling.

So, good luck to the PBA. The integrity of two police forces is now at stake.

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Pair of publishers join Modern Luxury’s sales team

Modern Luxury, the regional magazine publisher, has landed two veteran publishers to bolster its national sales team.

Marcy Bloom, who headed to Ghana to work with orphans after her job as publisher of Lucky magazine ended a year ago, has landed as a senior vice president and group publisher at Modern Luxury.

Michael Wolfe, a veteran publisher of Men's Journal at Wenner Media, and who was most recently publisher of The Week and the digital site Mental Floss, is also joining Modern Luxury as publisher.

Wolfe will be charged with overseeing national sales for the sprawling network of 40 luxury magazines.

Bloom will be the top national sales and marketing executive at the company that is headed by CEO Michael Dickey.

The Dickey family is also behind radio network Cumulus Media, although the privately held publisher and the publicly traded radio company operate independently.

Modern Luxury battles Niche Media, owned by the feuding Greenspun family in Las Vegas, for dominance in the regional magazine market.

Niche recently launched Austin magazine, and Modern luxury recently acquired Scottsdale.

Last year Modern Luxury launched Beach to square off against one of Niche's flagships titles, Hamptons Magazine.

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Another exit at Time Inc.

Fran Hauser, one of the top digital people at Time Inc., is exiting.

The well-respected executive had been president of digital for the old Entertainment & Style Group that included People and In Style, as well the Lifestyle Group that included titles Cooking Light, Sunset and Health.

The rumor that she would exit has been circulating ever since CEO Joe Ripp passed her over for the top chief technology officer job that went to Colin Bodell.

Hauser's departure means virtually the entire upper echelon of executives connected to the top money-making People group have exited the company recently.

That includes Time Inc. Editor-in-Chief Martha Nelson, who had run People and In Style, People top editor Larry Hackett and People's top digital person, Mark Golin.

David Geithner, the executive vice president in charge of the since-disbanded Entertainment & Style Group, was also among those let go when the company recently consolidated into two operating groups from three.

Hauser finally confirmed her departure on her Facebook page on Monday.

"It is with both excitement and sadness that after 15 years with Time Warner (and 10 with Time Inc.), I'm leaving the company. I'm so grateful to all of my amazing colleagues for their friendship, support and mentorship through the years. Looking forward to sharing my next chapter with all of you!"

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Bloomberg’s Bolton signs off, heads to Fox

In the continuing shuffle of business news networks' anchor chairs, on Friday Bloomberg TV lost Deirdre Bolton to Fox Business Network, sources tell On the Money.

There is believed to be an announcement in the next few days detailing Bolton's assignment, sources tell OTM.

Bolton, who hosted "Money Moves," a show on alternative investments in hedge funds, private equity, venture capital, angel investing and real estate, joined Bloomberg in 1999.

Prior to Bloomberg, Bolton worked at Société Générale in institutional equity sales.

On Monday, star anchor Maria Bartiromo will also start developing her new daily show for Fox Business Network.

Bartiromo will also anchor a weekly business-oriented show for Fox News Channel.

Her shows are scheduled to debut next month, the network said.

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Millennials have little tolerance for stocks, risk

The Great Recession is haunting today's millennials.

New York public high-school teacher Brian Heiss is hardworking and as financially conservative as someone born during the Great Depression —and a surprising new study reveals that his approach is typical of his 21- to 36-year-old age group.

The study, by UBS Wealth Management, also dispels notions of millennials as lazy, narcissistic, entitled and digitally obsessed.

Heiss, 29, single and living in Bedford-Stuyvesant, tends bar part time to supplement his teacher's salary and occasionally plays drums in a rock band.

"I always want to work more, and I always want to do well," Heiss told The Post, admitting his mindset has been darkened by the 2008 financial crisis. "[My parents'] investments got hit terribly hard during the crisis. I was managing a restaurant at that time, and it went under. I was soon out of a job, and it was a tough time."

Though the Great Recession is history, its effects linger in the millennial mind.

"Millennials seem to be permanently scarred by the 2008 financial crisis," said Emily Pachuta, head of investor insights at UBS WMA.

"They have a Depression-era mindset, largely because they experienced market-volatility and job-security issues very early in their careers, or watched their parents experience them — and it has had a significant impact on their attitudes and behaviors."

Cash is king for this group. While one in three millennials, the so-called Generation Y, describe their investment-risk tolerance as either conservative or somewhat conservative, typically more than half their portfolio is made up of cash.

That's a startling contrast to the 23 percent in cash for other investors, the UBS WMA study reveals.

Older Americans overall have 46 percent of their money tied up in stocks, compared with 28 percent for millennials. Meanwhile, only a meager 12 percent of millennials said they would invest "found money" in the market, and a mere 28 percent consider long-term investing a path to success.

"Though investment theory suggests that Generation Y should be the most aggressive investors due to their age, they are actually the most conservative," according to a separate survey of American households by Hearts & Wallets. "Seventy percent of their assets are in cash."

Simply put, millennials are wary of taking financial advice from advisers. "Do I trust Wall Street? Not really," said Heiss. "I mean, there [are] obviously good people doing good things on Wall Street. But a lot of the finance types are in it for themselves."

Heiss — who has about $30,000 in student debt outstanding and for whom any thoughts of retiring on a public pension are a distant dream — plans to work hard and save hard to shore up his personal finances, though he admits that's tough with his financial obligations.

Heiss has already brought his student loans down from $50,000

The study found that money is the single most important indicator of success for nearly half of millennials, with a household income of $220,000 seeming about right to meet that standard.

"I see the friends in my circle, they're really ambitious and hard-working people," said Heiss. "Every once in a while, one of them might have to go on unemployment, and that is not something they like to do."

"Money means a lot to me," he said. "I need to take care of my student loans because that is where I can maximize my dollars."

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Shut the Buc up: Sapp silenced

Warren Sapp's bust in Canton would be wise to shut its yap now. And make room for the gap-toothed bust representing the New York Football Giants.

Michael Strahan wasn't the dynamic force of nature Lawrence Taylor was. Strahan didn't revolutionize the position of defensive end the way LT revolutionized outside linebacker.

But you didn't beat the Giants unless you blocked Strahan, the unquestioned emotional and inspirational leader of Big Blue and a Super Bowl champion before riding off into the sunset with his franchise-record 141 ¹/₂ sacks.

I had asked Bill Parcells his thoughts about Strahan's Hall of Fame candidacy: "The more Giants the better," he said.

"I think he was a very good player, and he stood the test of time," Parcells said.

I asked Parcells: So do you think he belongs having a bust near yours — which may or may not be talking to you?

Parcells chuckled and said: "I'm busy with watching the ones I got in there with me already."

Does Strahan belong, yes or no, Giant aside?

"Well, I can't put that aside, but I believe he does, yes," Parcells said.

Parcells, like Strahan, should have made it to Canton in his first year of eligibility instead of his second. Sapp's anti-Strahan pettiness only served as a reminder that class is not a prerequisite for Canton.

Good for Strahan that he received his due at Radio City Music Hall, in his adopted city.

"Everything is better in New York," Strahan said.

Strahan deserves the greatest football honor as much, if not more than Sapp. All the offensive tackles and quarterbacks and running backs who played against him, all the defensive players who played alongside him, all the coaches who coached against him, all the coaches who coached him, vouch for him. Hell, even Kelly Ripa vouches for him.

"I was scared every time I put on a uniform and stepped on the field," Strahan said in "A Football Life: Michael Strahan." "I'm scared every day I go into the ["Live With Kelly and Michael"] studio, and I come on stage because I fear that I will not live up to what is expected. I fear that somebody who spent a lot of money to come into our studio, to come to New York and they'll walk away and go, 'I could have stayed at home.' I feared that as a player a fan would come to the stands and I wouldn't perform well. Just the way I'm built. I'm more scared of failure than I am excited about the accolades that come with success."

He was a prideful player, never the biggest or the strongest, but very much like Muhammad Ali, Floyd Mayweather or Bernard Hopkins in his ability to figure out his opponent during the heat of battle and find a way to win. He was a master at gaining leverage on the man or men in his way in the trenches.

"I remember the first day I walked into the locker room like it was yesterday. Mr. [Wellington] Mara, Lawrence Taylor — Harry Carson was already gone, but I remember the first time I meant him," Strahan said. "Frank Gifford — the first time I met those guys I learned more about the history of the Giants. And now to be included with the great players in the history of the NFL, going in as a New York Giant, it's unbelievable."

It was Strahan who first railed against the authoritarian ways of coach Tom Coughlin, but grew to embrace him once Coughlin added the personal touch and became the kind of lieutenant for him that George Martin and Harry Carson were for Parcells.

It was Strahan who, before Eli Manning engineered the dramatic, game-winning drive that would win Super Bowl XLII, implored his defense to believe on the sidelines.

It was Strahan who stole the show following the Canyon of Heroes parade at City Hall when he erupted into his "We stomped you out" rendition on stage.

"That was really like our battle cry. When all the odds are against you and everyone says you can't do something, we'll just stomp out the other team, we'll stomp out the critics, we'll stomp out everybody that didn't believe in us," Strahan said prior to the Giants' Super Bowl XLVI victory over the same Patriots.

Live With Michael and Warren. Many Sappy returns.

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Christie blasts Bridgegate accuser amid new accusations

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie Saturday blasted "Bridgegate'' accuser David Wildstein as someone who'll "do and say anything to save David Wildstein."

Christie criticized his high school classmate for claiming that "evidence exists" that the governor knew about lane closures at the George Washington Bridge in September as they were happening.

"In David Wildstein's past, people and newspaper accounts have described him as 'tumultuous' and someone who 'made moves that were not productive,' " said a statement that, says Politico, was sent by Christie's office to "friends and allies.''

The statement trashes Wildstein — who got his $150,000-a-year Port Authority job through Christie and now is offering to rat out the governor in exchange for immunity from prosecution.

It even dredges up accusations dating back to their high school days, claiming Wildstein was "publicly accused by his . . . social studies teacher of deceptive behavior."

More recent alleged transgressions, according to the statement, include Wildstein having a "strange habit of registering Web addresses for other people's names without telling them" and writing as the "anonymous blogger known as Wally Edge."

The statement also takes aim at The New York Times for its story quoting a letter to the PA from Wildstein's lawyer, Alan Zegas, seeking reimbursment for his client's legal bills.

"A media firestorm was set off by sloppy reporting from the New York Times and their suggestion that there was actually 'evidence' when it was a letter alleging that 'evidence exists,' " the statement claimed.

"Forced to change the lead almost immediately, the Times was roundly criticized, and its editor was forced to issue this extraordinary statement to the Huffington Post: 'We've made probably dozens of changes to the story to make it more precise. That was one of them. I bet there will be dozens more.' "

The Times responded Saturday night, saying, "We regularly update Web stories for clarity, as we did in this case. We do not note changes unless it involves an error.''

Christie has been accused of orchestrating massive tieups on the bridge approaches to punish the mayor of Fort Lee for not endorsing him in the latest gubernatorial race.

Wildstein became infamous for his email exchange with Christie aide Bridget Anne Kelly, in which she wrote, "Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee."

He replied: "Got it."

The special counsel for the state legislature's Bridgegate probe, Reid J. Schar, said its investigation will continue despite a separate investigation being mounted by the US Attorney's Office. "I am comfortable that the Committee's investigation may continue," he said.

"We will be mindful of the need to avoid taking steps that could inappropriately impede any investigation the US Attorney's Office may be conducting."

Earlier Saturday, Christie took to the stage in Times Square for a ceremonial Super Bowl handoff, then ran for daylight from Bridgegate questions.

On member of the audience jeered, "We hate traffic.!''

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Italian wine company working to snag de Blasio

A mayor who eats pizza with a knife and fork must have a weakness for a good bottle of Barolo.

That, at least, was the thinking at Vinitaly, a Verona, Italy-based group that promotes Italian vino worldwide.

For the past month and a half, Vinitaly has worked doggedly to snag Bill de Blasio to kick off its annual trade show at the Metropolitan Pavilion this week.

"Please be assured of my highest consideration," Vinitaly CEO Giovanni Montovani wrote in a Jan. 9 letter to the mayor.

Yet de Blasio's people thus far have been silent, Vinitaly officials lament.

Getting de Blasio to show up would be a coup. The mayor has become a celebrity in Italy, and has been vocal about his affection for his grandfather Giovanni's homeland.

Last week, Vinitaly reps knocked on the doors at City Hall, bearing a friendship plaque. A staffer came out to receive it and "may or may not have dumped the plaque into the East River," according to Vinitaly publicist Megan McGowan.

"We're going to send him some of the wines we're drinking at the event," McGowan told The Post.

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Amanda Knox: I’ll be a fugitive

Amanda Knox risks extradition to Italy if she leaves the United States following her new murder conviction by an appeals court in Florence.

In the US, many who followed the seven-year case view her as the victim of an out-of-control legal process. She'll have a very good chance of persuading the State Department to reject an extradition request, legal experts said.

But if Knox travels to any of the dozens of countries that have extradition treaties with Italy, she'll likely be sent back to face trial.

That includes Canada, a two-hour ferry ride from her Seattle home — as well as Mexico, most of Europe and South America.

Knox made it clear she won't voluntarily return to Italy.

"I will never willingly go back . . . Legally, I'll be a fugitive," she told ABC's "Good Morning America."

She said she was shocked by the decision by the eight-person appeals jury to convict her of murdering her fellow exchange student Meredith Kercher in 2007.

"It really hit me like a train," she said.

Italian authorities made no immediate move to secure her return — but they seized the passport of her co-defendant and former boyfriend after he briefly left the country.

Officials said Raffaele Sollecito drove 250 miles from Italy to Austria on Thursday afternoon while the appeals court was about to reconvict him.

His lawyer, Luca Maori, said Sollecito wasn't trying to flee justice but only wanted to be with his new girlfriend, who lives in the Italy-Austrian border area. Maori said Sollecito voluntarily went to Italian police to surrender his passport and ID papers.

But a local police official, Massimiliano Ortolan, said police were tipped off that Sollecito had checked into a hotel in Venzone, on the Italian side of the border — and had to wake him and his girlfriend up Friday morning and bring him to a police station.

Ortolan noted Venzone is close to the Italian border with Slovenia and Austria.

The United States has had an extradition treaty with Italy since 1984 and has denied at least several requests since then.

A spokeswoman said the State Department is monitoring the case as it works its way through the Italian legal system. That process is expected to take as long as a year.

Modal Trigger

The presiding judge Alessandro Nencini, center, reads the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the verdict of the Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito retrial, Florence.

EPA/MAURIZIO DEGL'INNOCENTI

During an interview with Robin Roberts, Amanda Knox vowed to fight her murder conviction.

Ida Mae Astute/ABC via Getty Images)

The judgment is overturned in Meredith Kercher's murder case, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito are found guilty.

Splash News

From left: Meredith Kercher's sister Stephanie Kercher, brother Lyle Kercher and lawyer Francesco Maresca speak to the press at the Star Hotel the day after the final verdict of the Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito retrial at the Courthouse of Florence on Jan. 31.

Franco Origlia/Getty Images

Amanda Knox acknowledges the cheers of supporters while her mother Edda Mellas comforts her in Seattle, Washington. Knox arrived back in hometown of Seattle, WA from Rome, Italy after she and ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito won the appeal against the conviction in 2009 of killing their British roommate Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy .

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Amanda Knox speaks at a news conference shortly after her arrival at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in Seattle.

AP Photo

An emotional Amanda Knox enters a press conference in Seattle, Washington. Knox arrived back in hometown of Seattle, WA from Rome, Italy after she and ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito won the appeal against the conviction in 2009 of killing their British roommate Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox with Italian senior police official, Antonio del Greco (R) next to her arrives at Leonardo Da Vinci airport in Rome, Italy, preparing to leave for Seattle, via London on a British Airways flight. Knox was acquitted of murder and sexual assault by an Italian appeal court after spending four years in custody over the killing of her British housemate Meredith Kercher.

EPA

Amanda Knox's smiles at the Leonardo Da Vinci airport in Rome. Knox was cleared of the murder of British student Meredith Kercher, on Tuesday thanked supporters who believed in her innocence as she prepared to return home to the United States after four years in jail.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox smiles at the Leonardo Da Vinci airport in Fiumicino Tuesday. Knox, cleared of the murder of British student Meredith Kercher, thanked supporters who believed in her innocence as she prepared to return home to Seattle after four years in jail.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox's as she leaves the Leonardo Da Vinci airport in Rome, Italy.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox is accompanied by Italian senior police official, Antonio del Greco (R) as she departure the Leonardo Da Vinci airport in Rome, Italy.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox's mother Edda waits at the check-in before departing the Leonardo Da Vinci airport in Rome.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox, who spent nearly four years in jail after her roommate's murder, weeps with emotion after an Italian court set her free.

Splash News

People in the courtroom celebrate the verdict.

ZUMA Press

Knox celebrates the verdict with a hug after the court cleared her.

ZUMA Press

A woman reacts as she reads a newspaper article about the case.

Reuters

Relatives of Knox react as they hear the verdict during her appeal trial session in Perugia, Italy.

Reuters

Knox's mother Edda Mellas cries in Perugia's court after the verdict.

Reuters

Knox's aunt Janet Huff, reacts after hearing the verdict that overturns her niece's conviction.

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Knox collapsed in tears after the verdict was read.

AP

Supporters of Knox listen as an Italian jury overturned her conviction for killing a British student.

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Knox's sister hugs a supporter in Perugia's Court of Appeal after the verdict.

EPA

Deanna Knox and father Curt Knox speak to the media from Perugia's Court of Appeal.

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Knox reacts in shock to news of her newfound freedom.

ZUMA Press

Amanda Knox breaks in tears after hearing the verdict that overturns her conviction and acquits her of murdering her British roommate Meredith Kercher, at the Perugia court, central Italy.

AP Photo

Amanda Knox breaks in tears as she is taken away after hearing the verdict that overturns her conviction and acquits her of murdering her British roommate Meredith Kercher.

AP Photo

Supporters of Amanda Knox (L to R) John Lang, Kellanne Henry and Margaret Ralph celebrate in a hotel after an Italian jury overturned of Knox's conviction for killing British student Meredith Kercher.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox cries as she walks away after hearing the verdict that overturns her conviction and acquits her of murder.

AP Photo

Amanda Knox cries as she walks away after hearing the verdict that overturns her conviction and acquits her of murder.

AP Photo

Italian lawyer lawyer Maria Del Grosso, right, hugs Amanda Knox after the verdict that overturns her conviction and acquits her of murder.

AP Photo

A penitentiary police officer smiles as she escorts Amanda Knox out of court after an Italian jury convicted the American student of murdering her British roommate.

AP Photo

American student Amanda Knox reacts to an Italian jury convicting her of 26 years in prison for the murder and sexual assault of her British roommate Meredith Kercher more than two years ago while studying in Perugia in Italy's central Umbria region.

EPA

Meredith Kercher's body was found in a pool of blood with her throat slit on Nov. 2, 2007, in the bedroom of the house she shared with Amanda Knox. Prosecutors sought life sentences, including nine months of daytime solitary confinement for Knox and two months for Sollecito. Both had pleaded innocent.

EPA

The day before deliberations began, the former University of Washington student made an emotional appeal in which she said she was not a murderer and didn't want to have "the mask of an assassin" forced onto her. "I am scared of being branded what I am not," she told the jurors, speaking in near-perfect Italian.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox before hearing the final verdict.

AP

Amanda Knox arriving for the last day of trial.

EPA

Amanda Knox's ex-boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito also was convicted.

AFP/Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AP

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

EPA

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AFP/Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AP

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AFP/Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AFP/Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AP

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AP

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AP

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AFP/Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

REUTERS

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

AFP/Getty Images

Amanda Knox on trial for the murder of Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

REUTERS

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Strahan on the cusp of scoring his Hall-of-Fame nod

When Jim Fassel was the offensive coordinator for the Cardinals, he had to figure out a way to block Michael Strahan not once, but twice a season. This was a young Strahan, not yet a finished product, and yet Fassel often found himself stumped.

"I had my eyes on him,'' Fassel told The Post from Las Vegas. "We put in some things to try to neutralize him and that's the highest accolade you can give a guy: 'I got to game-plan against him.' ''

Fassel was hired in 1997 as head coach of the Giants and for the next seven years had all those Strahan sacks and tackles on his side. It was under Fassel that Strahan blossomed into one of the NFL's premier defensive ends, combining production with high-performance to emerge, for the second straight year, as one of the 17 finalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The Class of 2014 will be revealed Saturday night.

"The guy should have gotten in last year,'' Fassel said.

Strahan made it to the cut to 10 a year ago, but was not among the five players inducted into the 2013 class enshrined in Canton. He's up for it again and the buzz around the selection process is he has a strong chance this time around, which would be fitting, with Super Bowl XLVIII at MetLife Stadium — adjacent to where Giants Stadium stood and Strahan starred.

"This is how I look at it,'' Strahan said. "Football was a great part of my life, and I am so grateful for everything. I lasted 15 years. I didn't finish my career as a guy who people looked at and said, 'He's done.' They never looked at me and said I should give money back. 'He's stealing.' They never did that with me. I took a lot of pride on everything I did."

Strahan has fashioned an overwhelmingly successful post-playing career. He retired after the Giants won Super Bowl XLII and immediately landed a prime spot on "FOX NFL Sunday.'' He became a crossover star by replacing Regis Philbin as Kelly Ripa's co-host on the wildly-popular "Live with Kelly and Michael.''

Strahan, 42, certainly has Hall of Fame credentials — a Giants record 141.5 sacks, seven Pro Bowls, a four-time All-Pro and the 2001 Defensive Player of the Year after his NFL single-season record 22.5 sacks. Unlike many supreme pass-rushers, Strahan was perhaps the best run-stopping defensive end of his generation.

Strahan had 18 sacks in his first three years playing for Dan Reeves and 27.5 sacks in his last four years playing for Tom Coughlin. In between, Strahan had 96 sacks in seven years for Fassel.

"Where he developed a lot was using the speed, up-field rush and get the tackle on his heels," Fassel said. "The guy was back-pedaling so fast and then he would just change into a power rusher and take the guy and just dump him into the quarterback's lap.

"He had a lot of sacks where he just took the offensive tackle and threw him into the quarterback and then tackled the quarterback," Fassel said. "People made him a target: 'We got to take this guy out of the game or else he's going to beat us himself.' ''

Among the 17 finalists, four are in their first year of eligibility: Derrick Brooks, Marvin Harrison, Walter Jones and coach Tony Dungy. The others up for consideration are Morten Andersen, John Lynch, Jerome Bettis, Tim Brown, Kevin Greene, Ray Guy, Charles Haley, Claude Humphrey, Andre Reed, Will Shields, Aeneas Williams, former 49ers owner Eddie DeBartolo and Strahan.

"Your career is not who you are, a career is what you do,'' Strahan said. "I won a Super Bowl, I've been to Pro Bowls, I've been All-Pro, I've been Player of the Year. I've done everything I can do. It's not up to me to vote, to see if I'm in the Hall of Fame.

"For some guys, maybe, that's their life. That's all they have to hold on to. For me, that's not it."

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Mets loan restructuring shows team’s finances are healing

To build upon what already had been a successful Mets offseason, surely their long-suffering fans would have preferred a Stephen Drew signing or a veteran bullpen arm to provide some coverage for Bobby Parnell's return from neck surgery.

Instead, when they picked up their copy of The Post on Friday, Mets loyalists learned their club's owners, the ones they have lived to loathe, have latched onto quite a sturdy life preserver.

The idealists in the crowd will mourn. The realists will accept this news and its upside: A future in which the Mets have more dollars for talent and, just as important, more room for error.

As The Post's Josh Kosman reported exclusively, Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz are close to refinancing their $250 million loan over seven years and at a lower interest rate, sparing them from the pressure of a principal payment this spring; no cash paydown will be required. That the Mets' owners are on the verge of securing this relief speaks to their improved standing in the banking community.

Wilpon and Katz won't celebrate by calling Scott Boras and presenting him a blank check for Drew, who could join Bartolo Colon and Curtis Granderson to make this a potentially transformative winter for the Mets. No, if we've learned anything since Bernie Madoff's arrest in December 2008, it's that the Mets' ownership will heal very, very deliberately from this severe financial wound.

There has been healing, however. Granderson cost $60 million (over four years) and Colon $20 million (over two years). Maybe the Mets will surprise us and import Drew, too, on a short-term deal, although history shows these Mets free-agent flirtations typically conclude with the player going elsewhere.

History reminds us of another fact: The Mets did spend considerably from 2005 through 2011, jumping into sizable commitments with the likes of Jason Bay, Carlos Beltran, Pedro Martinez, Francisco Rodriguez, Johan Santana and Billy Wagner. The chaos arrived when the Bay and Santana contracts both turned into albatrosses while the Madoff devastation severely limited the Mets' ability to spend. The Mets vow they will increase their payroll with time and improved flexibility in their personal finances, and they have a track record to support that contention.

Neither the 2009 Bay free-agent signing nor the 2008 Santana trade with the Twins (contingent upon Santana signing an extension with the Mets) should win any awards for great process. Bay was a defensively limited corner outfielder, while Santana set off red flags with his shaky 2007 in Minnesota. However, even the best-run clubs will occasionally whiff on transactions.

The key, moving forward, is to possess that room for error. To not get crushed by one or two misses on the open market as did the 2011-13 Mets by Bay and Santana.

You can shake your fist at Wilpon and Katz for putting their customers through such duress while continuing to charge New York-level ticket prices, rather than just drawing the white flag and selling the franchise to a more stable owner. You can shake your other fist at Bud Selig for helping to keep his longtime pal, Wilpon, afloat and not trying to run out the Mets' owners the way he did with Dodgers dope Frank McCourt.

You wouldn't be wrong in either case. But you'd be more dated than a Hannah Montana poster. That stuff is history.

Wilpon and Katz are survivors who are gaining strength. With fourth-year general manager Sandy Alderson having waited out the Bay/Santana/Madoff slowdown, ramped up the club's farm system and fired some free-agency bullets, we'll see whether the 2014 Mets can follow the lead of Wall Street and bring Alderson's bosses some much-needed relief.

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Inequality obsessions

During a recent lunch in a ­restaurant, someone complimented my wife on the perfume she was wearing. But I was wholly unaware that she was wearing perfume, even though we'd been in a car together for about half an hour, driving to the restaurant.

My sense of smell is very poor. But there is one thing I can smell far better than most people — gas escaping. During my years of living on the Stanford University campus, and walking back and forth to work at my office, I more than once passed a faculty house and smelled gas escaping. When there was nobody home, I would leave a note, warning them.

When walking past the same house again a few days later, I could see where the utility company had been digging in the yard — and, after that, there was no more smell of gas escaping. But apparently the people who lived in these homes had not smelled anything.

These little episodes have much wider implications. Most of us are much better at some things than at others, and what we are good at can vary enormously from one person to another. Despite the preoccupation of intellectuals with equality, we are all very unequal in what we do well and what we do badly.

It may not be innate, like a sense of smell, but differences in capabilities are inescapable, and they make a big difference in what and how much we can contribute to each other's economic and other well-being. If we all had the same capabilities and the same limitations, one individual's limitations would be the same as the limitations of the entire human species.

We are lucky that we're so different, so that the capabilities of other people can cover our limitations.

One of the problems with so many discussions of income and wealth is that the intelligentsia are so obsessed with the money people receive that they give little or no attention to what causes money to be paid to them in the first place.

The money itself is not wealth. Otherwise the government could make us all rich just by printing more of it. From the standpoint of a society as a whole, money is just an artificial device to give us incentives to produce real things.

Those goods and services are the real "wealth of nations," as Adam Smith titled his treatise on economics in the 18th century.

Yet when the intelligentsia discuss such things as the historic fortunes of people like John D. Rockefeller, they usually pay little — if any — attention to what it was that caused millions of people to voluntarily turn their individually modest sums of money over to Rockefeller, adding up to his vast fortune.

What Rockefeller did first to earn their money was find ways to bring down the cost of producing and distributing kerosene to a fraction of what it had been before his innovations. This profoundly changed the lives of millions of working people.

Before Rockefeller came along in the 19th century, the ancient saying, "The night cometh when no man can work" still applied. There were not yet electric lights, and burning kerosene for hours every night was not something ordinary working people could afford. For millions of people, there was little to do after dark, except go to bed.

Too many discussions of large fortunes attribute them to "greed" — as if wanting a lot of money is enough to cause other people to hand it over. It's a childish idea, when you stop and think about it — but who stops and thinks these days?

The transfer of money was a ­zero-sum process. What increased the wealth of society was Rockefel­ler's cheap kerosene that added hundreds of hours of light to people's lives annually.

Edison, Ford, the Wright brothers and innumerable others also created unprecedented expansions of the lives of ordinary people. The individual fortunes represented a fraction of the wealth created.

Even those of us who create goods and services in more mundane ways receive income that may be very important to us, but it is what we create for others, with our widely varying capabilities, that is the real wealth of nations.

Intellectuals' obsession with income statistics — calling envy "social justice" — ignores vast differences in productivity that are far more fundamental to everyone's well-being. Killing the goose that lays the golden egg has ruined many economies.

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Pro-choice advocates poorly defending their cause

Wendy Davis, a Democratic state senator running to replace Rick Perry as governor of Texas, owes her political stardom to two things: a pair of pink sneakers and her unstinting support for a woman's right to terminate a late-term pregnancy in a substandard clinic. Yay feminism!

Last year, Davis led an 11-hour filibuster — that's where the sneakers came in handy — to block legislation that would ban abortion after 20 weeks and require abortion clinics to meet the same standards that ­hospital-style surgical centers do.

This was all going on against the backdrop of the sensational Kermit Gosnell case in Pennsylvania. Gosnell ran a bloody, filthy "clinic" where he performed late-term abortions with a barbarity you'd expect to find in a "Saw" movie. Sometimes he'd "snip" the spines of fully delivered babies with a pair of scissors. His instruments were so unsanitary that some women got STDs from them. Cat feces was a common sight on the procedure room floors.

In short, you didn't need to be an abortion-rights activist to find the story of interest, but you'd certainly expect an activist to be up to speed on it.

Working on that theory, The Weekly Standard's John McCormack caught up with Davis last August to ask her a few questions.

McCormack noted that once you got past the squalor and filth of the clinic, Gosnell's illegal late-term abortions weren't all that different from legal late-term abortions in other states. "What is the difference," McCormack asked, "between legal abortion at 23 weeks and what Gosnell did? Do you see a distinction between those two [acts]?"

"I don't know what happened in the Gosnell case," Davis replied. "But I do know that it happened in an ambulatory surgical center. And, in Texas, changing our clinics to that standard obviously isn't going to make a difference."

She should have stopped with "I don't know what happened in the Gosnell case" — because in the words of the grand jury report, the "abhorrent conditions and practices inside Gosnell's clinic [were] directly attributable to the Pennsylvania Health Department's refusal to treat abortion clinics as ambulatory surgical facilities."

So the one thing she claimed to know wasn't true. Also, what curious incuriosity. If you were suddenly a national leader on an issue you felt passionately about, wouldn't you want to know what happened in a case that cuts to the heart of your cause?

Not Davis. Her time is better spent denouncing the ignorance of women who disagree with her. When McCormack asked what to make of the fact that a majority of American women support a ban on late-term abortions, Davis responded, "I again think that a lot of people don't really understand the landscape of what's happening in that arena today."

Think about that. In the course of a short conversation, she revealed that she didn't know what she was talking about while casually dismissing the majority of American women who disagreed with her as not knowing what they're talking about.

Let's fast-forward to 2014. Davis was ­recently interviewed by Jorge Ramos of TV's Fusion. He asked her, "When does life start? When does a human being become one?"

Davis answered with a non-answer: "You know, the Supreme Court of course has answered this decision, in terms of what our protections are." Blah blah blah.

Tom Bevan of Real Clear Politics slammed Davis for being "too cowardly to give a straight answer, let alone a thoughtful one, to a straightforward question that goes to the heart of a matter she has made the signature issue of her political life."

I agree. But Davis is merely at the forefront of the cowardice epidemic. On the anniversary of Roe v. Wade earlier this month, President Obama couldn't bring himself to say the word "abortion," preferring instead virtually every poll-tested buzzword. Indeed, in all of the "war on women" noise, abortion is almost always wrapped in the velvety euphemisms of "women's health" and "reproductive choice."

It should tell you something when passionate advocates of unrestricted abortion are so uncomfortable talking about . . . abortion.

Perhaps all of the rage abortion extremists aim at their opponents is cover for a deep insecurity — maybe psychological, definitely political — about the reality of what they are defending. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) once said that life begins "when you bring your baby home" from the hospital. That is not very far from Wendy Davis' position. But she doesn't want to say that — certainly not in Texas! Better to change the subject to the evils of her opponents and — hey — have you seen my sneakers?

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