Once-Brash Big Apple Wilts in Crisis

A New York state of mind is giving the city’s big spenders a migraine, the Washington Post reports. Economic meltdown has withered the Big Apple, where private jet and yacht bookings are off, lavish parties are being trimmed, and lofts sit freshly vacant. Worse, the Mets and Yankees are down, and Rudy and Hillary are out of the presidential race.

“This brash, in-your-face city suddenly seems to have lost its mojo,” Keith Richburg and Robin Shulmane write. Wall Street resembles an eerie “amusement park,” and plunging assets have landed investors on the couch. “These are individuals who have become successful at taking control of things,” said one psychologist, “and now they are reduced to a kind of helplessness.”
(More New York stories.)