November 16, 1994

DOES Libby like "Stargate"? You bet. Big time. No need to ask, really. How could a movie in which Kurt Russell kicks keister among the ancient Egyptians at the far end of the universe fail to enchant Libby Gelman-Waxner, the monthly film critic for Premiere magazine and the finest judge of cinematic art ever to come out of Great Neck, L.I.? "Libby is guided primarily by trailers, and 'Stargate' resembles 40 trailers back to back," says Paul Rudnick, Libby's creator, dissecting the film at a Times Square restaurant around the corner from the Criterion Center, where he has just seen it. "Also, Libby is a huge Kurt Russell fan, although in this film he seems to be playing an angry shaving brush." (The reference is to Mr. Russell's coif, the fiercest-looking crew cut since Michael Douglas's buzz job in "Falling Down.")

The Thanksgiving menu springs from the soil of the Americas. The sentimental favorites are cranberries, corn, squash, pumpkins, pecans, wild rice, sweet potatoes and turkey. But now the shopping list of foods native to the New World is expanding. Other foods that were grown or gathered by American Indians, like Jerusalem artichokes, blue corn, amaranth and appaloosa beans, are increasingly showing up on supermarket shelves.

With or Without U.S., Allies Will Blockade Bosnia Arms Meeting in Brussels, Washington's NATO allies said they would continue their sea blockade of arms shipments to Bosnia. The statement makes it clear that the Americans' decision to stop enforcing the embargo will have little effect. Page A3. Commuter Air Safety A Federal board called for making the rules on flying hours and training the same for pilots at both commuter and major airlines. Page A12. New York's Tax Tug-of-War With a possible tax-cut plan of their own, Assembly Democrats prepared to battle George E. Pataki over his central campaign pledge. Page B1. A Mystery in Space Telescope observations have left cosmologists more mystified than ever about the universe's "dark matter," so they are shifting the focus of their search. Page B8.

Seeking the solace of salami and the balm of brisket amid the aftershocks of the 1993 earthquake, a long line of people gathered outside Nate 'n Al's, the venerable show-biz delicatessen here. When some customers grew antsy at the wait, a counterman reminded them that they had a choice: they could always go down the block to the Carnegie Deli. The Carnegie Deli. In New York, the sound of those words would have been like chicken soup to shattered nerves. But something was evidently lost in transit between Seventh Avenue and 54th Street, site of the flagship Carnegie, and the corner of North Beverly Drive and Dayton Way, its West Coast outpost. At Nate 'n Al's that morning, no one even budged.

The nation's farmers have been reaping their most bountiful harvest ever in many important crops, benefiting shoppers for groceries from meat to cooking oil but costing taxpayers an estimated $3 billion to $4 billion in additional farm subsidies. Production of corn, the nation's biggest crop, is expected to reach 10.01 billion bushels, nearly 5.6 percent higher than 1992's record crop and almost 60 percent more than last year when the Midwest flooded and the Southeast baked, according to Department of Agriculture estimates released last Wednesday. Production also soared to new records for rice and soybeans, which are widely used in animal feed, cooking oil and food ingredients. Wheat crops, while short of records, were larger than average.