RICHARD SHIU'S brownstone on West 123rd Street was once an abandoned wreck, but now he looks on proudly as would-be buyers trek up the stairs to stare at the gas-burning fireplaces and mantels, the high ceilings and granite counters and the roof deck with clear views of the Midtown Manhattan skyline.     There was Cathy McGlynn, a graphic designer, and her husband, David, a photographer and artist, who were looking for an affordable alternative to their Upper West Side neighborhood, where they were putting their condominium on the market to take some profit and lower their costs.  

Going Condo in Harlem

A LOT of drivers, in a moment of urgent need or an episode of speed deprivation, have wished for a magic button to call up an extra 100 horsepower. The 2006 BMW M5 has one. Marked ''power,'' it is right there on the console next to the gearshift.      Magic buttons are something BMW's top-of-the-food-chain sport sedan has plenty of. This one makes available all 500 of the M5's horsepower; otherwise, the engine-control software enforces a 400-horsepower cap on the 5-liter V-10 engine.  

2006 BMW M5: Two Ways to Skin 500 Horsepower

Feminist crusader and author Betty Friedan dies at age 85; her first book The Feminine Mystique ignited feminist cause in 1963 with impassioned but clear-eyed analysis of issues that affected women's lives in years after World War II; helped found National Organization for Women in 1966; photos (L)

Betty Friedan, Who Ignited Cause in 'Feminine Mystique,' Dies at 85

Seattle Seahawks prepare to face Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl; drawing; photos (M)

Seahawks Keep Rhythm to Up-Tempo Beat

Pittsburgh Steelers prepare to face Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl; drawing; photos (M)

Stable and Steady Has Won Race for Steelers

Iraqi and American officials see troubling pattern of government corruption enabling flow of oil money and other funds to insurgency and threatening to undermine Iraq's economy; Finance Min Ali Allawi estimates insurgents reap 40 percent to 50 percent of all oil-smuggling profits through infiltration of refinery management and terrorizing truck drivers; frequent insurgent attacks on pipelines have caused Iraqi oil exports to plummet over past year; map; photos (L)

Oil Graft Fuels the Insurgency, Iraq and U.S. Say

Hairstylists are the new best friends of celebrities and other women; act as trusted confidants who will not switch allegiances and can ease friend's pain by making her look fabulous; photos (M)

A Shoulder to Cry on (Highlights Included)

Anthony Lewis reviews book At Canann's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68 by Taylor Branch; photos (L)

The Whirlwinds of Revolt

THE turnpike exit was not the one I had planned to take, but I found myself at the bottom of the off ramp anyway, waving the E-ZPass tag at the toll booth and merging onto Route 18. Overruling the plan to continue farther south, a Corvette and my subconscious conspired to drop me into a different, but still familiar, landscape.     With no particular timetable or goal -- other than to put some miles on the most powerful car Chevrolet has ever built, the 2006 Corvette Z06 -- I did not resist. A slight detour took me along a stretch of Highway 9, mythologized by a local singer named Springsteen, and still got me to the Jersey Shore where my exploits with cars began.  

2006 Corvette Z06: A 500-Horsepower Time Machine

WITH one hand, Jimmy Sturr, the polka king, reached for his pen. With the other, he picked up a glossy promotional flier featuring his brightly smiling head shot and the words ''FOURTEEN TIME GRAMMY AWARD WINNER.''     Sitting in his office 55 miles from Manhattan, in tiny Florida, N.Y., its walls cluttered with gold-colored castings of his records, snapshots of celebrities and dozens of albums with titles like ''Polka Fever'' and ''Super Polka Party,'' Mr. Sturr, whose frozen wave of light-brown hair and chipper smirk give him a slight resemblance to Regis Philbin, made a quick correction to the text, changing ''18 consecutive Grammy nominations'' to 19.  

The Polka King Rolls Out the Barrel for the 19th Time

ON a Baghdad street last month, one of the darker visions of Iraq's future suddenly materialized.     A group of about 20 uniformed Iraqi men, with a prisoner in its possession, was halted at a checkpoint. The men were wearing the telltale camouflage outfits of the police commandos, an American-trained paramilitary force that Sunni leaders here accuse of carrying out widespread atrocities. They were carrying ID cards from the Ministry of Interior. They seemed legitimate.  

Where the Shadows Have Shadows

New Orleans officials are in essence allowing random redevelopment to occur throughout city by agreeing nearly 90 percent of time to revise estimates of damage to individual properties below 50 percent; trend undermines plan by Mayor C Ray Nagin's rebuilding commission to hold off on building permits in damaged areas until more careful planning can take place; as many as 500 building permits are issued every day; photo (L)

Rebuilding New Orleans, One Appeal at a Time

THE posters outside Carnegie Hall one night last month trumpeted appearances by the magnificent Berlin Philharmonic and its star-powered music director, Simon Rattle. But inside the storied hall, humbler pie was being served: the Houston Symphony Orchestra and its unaffected Austrian conductor, Hans Graf.     The Berlin was presented -- that is, paid and promoted -- by Carnegie Hall. The same goes for such renowned institutions as the Vienna Philharmonic, the Chicago and Boston symphonies and the Cleveland and Philadelphia orchestras, which cruise through the hall every year like stately ocean liners.  

Carnegie Hall 4 Vry Lo Rnt

THE taxicab stops at the sign for the de-mining project. Five inches of fresh snow obscure the ground. Fikret, my Bosnian guide, leads me past blown-out houses, trenches in the woods, splintered bunkers, a Hapsburg-built tower from the 19th century accelerated to a ruin by war.      Then we are on the promontory looking over barbed wire down upon the city. Fikret points out the Kosevo Stadium, now nearly surrounded by cemeteries. Over there is Trebevic, he says. Once it was the site of the bobsled races. Now the mountain is divided between Bosnia and the Serb Republic, salted with mines, the run chipped with holes where the snipers once squinted over their rifles, stalking carelessness. Only from the hills does one grasp how pretty this city is, and how nakedly exposed it was.  

Emerging From the Shadow of War, Sarajevo Slowly Reclaims Its Lost Innocence

Neuroscientists say brain imaging machines are like Mars probe: they see surfaces, mountain peaks, valleys--without being able to take samples of underlying terrain; say regions that peak in activity when person is happy, guilty or jealous are connected to many other areas along complex circuits distributed throughout brain that are still unlit by computerized spotlight of imaging machine; say it is in these subterranean, subtle enfoldings of brain that they are most likely to discover its deepest secrets; drawing; photo (M)

Searching for the Person in the Brain

ARCHITECTS are not known for their modesty, so it was not entirely surprising when Duo Dickinson leapt out of his little red car, took one look at the rather forlorn-looking (but waterfront) weekend house recently for sale here and pronounced he could ''turn this into a showplace -- it's a piece of cake.''     Mr. Dickinson, an architect based in Madison, Conn., has written books on designing small houses, and this ranch-style cottage on half an acre was right up his alley. Long before he even entered the house, he had accepted the Sketch Pad assignment: to create a set of renderings for a completely redone cottage.  

Giving a Tired House a Tower

Interview with author Jay McInerney about his early success, his days as party animal and drug user, and his hope for new success with release of his new book The Good Life; photos (M)

His Morning After

Gretchen Morgenson column on wildfall bonuses that oil executives are receiving as result of escalating profits; analysts estimate that every $1 increase in per-barrel price of oil translates into 1.5 percent hike in Exxon Mobil earnings which, in turn, relates to earnings growth and bigger paychecks; Harvard Prof Lucian Bebchuk says sharp rise has to do with Iraq war and Chinese demand, not with managers' performance; photo (M)

Rising Prices Lift All Bonuses

Article on Elon Musk, who sold Internet business PayPal to eBay for $1.5 billion and is seeking new direction in life; Musk has invested $100 million in new company, Space Explorations Technology, or Space X, whose goal is to inexpensively launch satellites into orbit; hopes to launch small payloads to low Earth orbit, for price of $7 million, with series of rockets of his own design; photos (M)

A Bold Plan to Go Where Men Have Gone Before

GOVERNORS ISLAND, 172 acres of American history lying just off the southern tip of Manhattan, is terra incognita to most New Yorkers. Commuters, glimpsing it from the Staten Island Ferry, see only an array of abandoned modern buildings and two unpromising landmarks: a white ventilation tower belonging to the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel, and Castle Williams, a grim 19th-century fortification, dark red and pierced by black windows.      The island had belonged to the Army since the 1800's. The Coast Guard took over in 1965 but left in 1997, and it's been moldering ever since. Only within the past few months, after years of neglect and delay, has this stark backdrop to a cross-harbor commute emerged as a major concern for the city.  

Sleeping Beauty

Spotlight on case of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff has turned attention to widespread phenomenon of Congressional aide-turned-lobbyist; government watchdog groups note that at least 14 former aides of Rep John Boehner, new majority leader, have turned their connections into K Street lobbying jobs; photo (M)

Once Just an Aide, Now a King of K Street

Board of International Atomic Energy Agency votes, 27 to 3, to report Iran to United Nations Security Council, potentially opening door to international punishment of country for its suspected nuclear weapons program; Iran immediately announces that it will end voluntary cooperation with agency and begin fullscale production of enriched uranium; vote marks failure of British, French and German efforts to coax Iran into freezing nuclear activities with enticing political, technological and economic rewards; photo (L)

Nuclear Panel Votes to Report Tehran to U.N.

Home Front column on Suzanne Cohen, executive director of Dystrophic Epidermolysis Bullosa Research Association of America in Manhattan; epidermolysis bullosa is rare disease that is incurable and often fatal; photo (M)

Fighting a Little-Known Enemy

Profile of brothers Gerald and Raymond Cleveland, who have been diabetics since childhood and turn 90 and 85 respectively this year; experts know of no other childhood diabetic who has lived to be as old as Gerald and no one who has survived with disease as long as Raymond; Clevelands have lived long and healthy lives in part through extraordinary discipline in diet and exercise, but have suffered medical complications and harrowing close calls; timeline; photos (L)

Diabetic Brothers Beat Odds With Grit and Luck

DURING her brief lifetime, Elizabeth Short never starred in a single movie. There is no record of her having played so much as a bit part. Yet within popular culture, Short -- who frequently told friends she wanted to break into show business -- has emerged as something of an honorary leading lady whose shadowy life and violent death follow the contours of a classic film noir script.      She certainly had the looks. Along with a hubba-hubba figure, she possessed a great smile, alabaster skin and dark, curly hair. And she died right: young, mysteriously and gruesomely. Screaming headlines reporting her murder in 1947 warned of a ''werewolf maniac,'' as this city's five newspapers sought to outscoop one another. Photos of her corpse -- torso cut in two, face slashed into a hideous mock of a grin -- were suppressed.  

Dark Moment In the Harsh Hollywood Sun

Norma Daniela Candal Penedo, was a Puerto Rican actress and comedian who was best known for her role as Petunia on La criada malcriada.

February 5, 2006

Headlines from February 5, 2006

Going Condo in Harlem

2006 BMW M5: Two Ways to Skin 500 Horsepower

Betty Friedan, Who Ignited Cause in 'Feminine Mystique,' Dies at 85

Seahawks Keep Rhythm to Up-Tempo Beat

Stable and Steady Has Won Race for Steelers

Billboard 200

Unpredictable

The Breakthrough

Curtain Call: The Hits

Some Hearts

The Legend Of Johnny Cash

Notable Deaths

Historical Context for February 5, 2006