Tale of Two Cities

Possible there are more similarities between dining in New York and Los Angeles than either city would like to admit? From Michael Bauer, making the case for the superiority of SF and noting incidentally: "[NY's Drew Nieporent] says that in New York, there's always a jockeying for position and that the food is often less important to diners than where they sit...In New York he finds that many people use fake names and numbers. There are even several online businesses that make reservations to sell them to last-minute diners and don't bother to cancel if they can't sell the reservation." [Between Meals]