Marc Levy

@mhlevy.bsky.social

2748 Followers 3844 Following

Journalist in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

New York Times business article excerpt (doesn’t seem to be online yet): he could deal with the Steiners "off the radar" She added: "Just get it done. I don't want to know the details." Two months later, Mr. Wenig wrote to the communications chief, Steve Wymer, about Ina Steiner. "If we are ever going to take her down," he said, "now is the time." Mr. Wymer later texted Mr. Baugh that Ina Steiner "is a biased troll who needs to get BURNED DOWN." This might sound incriminating to a layperson, especially since the harassment operation started shortly after. But Andrew Lelling, the U.S. attorney who handled the criminal case, said it hadn't amounted to much. "In my experience, executives at companies say things like this all the time," Mr. Lelling told the filmmakers. "I think what you're seeing is loose talk by the executives at the company. But linkage is missing. Jim Baugh decided the right way to handle the situation is commit a federal crime. Is that something the senior executives could have reasonably expected?"
New York Times essay excerpt: Euphemism can feel so right. We imagine that if we create a new term for something we can get people to think about it differently. Surely more will understand that a "bum" isn't a reprobate if we refer to him as "homeless." I'm just old enough to remember when "homeless" was the new default in the 1980s - it sounded so polite, open-minded. But before long, sentiments associated with "bum" transferred to "homeless." We now have the dismissive slang term "homelessy" So we're supposed to say "unhoused.”
New York Times essay headlined “ maybe we’re not that polarized after all”
Paragraph says: “What happens if those of us who aren't driven by hate and who try to use reason rather than gut impulse (or at least like to think we do) leave? The bigots, the bots and the lunatics have the place to themselves.”
A screenshot of a trailer for the film “Night Nurse” quotes the website High on Films saying it is “a seductive, perversive thriller"
NYT story headlined: “Investor Sues Trump Family Over Crypto, Claiming Fraud”
NYT text: “The distrust is a busy two-way street: The United States says that Iran has routinely lied for years by claiming its nuclear program was for peaceful purposes only, and points to uncovered evidence of Tehran's past military nuclear research. Iran has also flouted its international commitments by building secret underground nuclear facilities.”
NYT headline and excerpt: “Iran's Doubts About Trump's Credibility Complicate Peace Process: Iranian leaders fear being burned again by President Trump, who tore up a nuclear agreement reached during the Obama administration after lengthy negotiations.”
BK press release: "Burger King is letting Guest feedback impact the future of the brand - as proven with the recent initiative inviting Guests to call or text President Tom Curtis. "Guests have already helped shape operations, restaurant image and the overall BK experience and now, they've inspired changes to the iconic, flame-grilled Whopper sandwich - the first in nearly 10 years. The higher-quality Whopper experience includes a more premium, better tasting bun, served in a box to ensure it makes it to Guests exactly the way it left the kitchen. Stacked tall with freshly cut onions and tomatoes, crisp lettuce, tangy pickles, and better tasting mayo, every Whopper is crafted to deliver the flame-grilled flavor Guests expect - now elevated from the first bite to the last. "These updates have refined the Whopper without changing what Guests love most. Still served with more than a quarter-pound of 100% flame-grilled beef, the Whopper now delivers an even higher-quality experience from bun to toppings to packaging, for the perfect bite, every time."
A paragraph from the April 5, 2026, Semafor newsletter: "Wall Street Journal editor-in-chief Emma Tucker is impressed by Fortune’s integration of AI into its newsroom. Last month, the Journal reported that Fortune editor Nick Lichtenberg had used AI to produce 600 stories and counting, and that AI-written stories now accounted for 20% of the publication’s overall traffic. In an encouraging personal email to Fortune editor Alyson Shontell shared with the publication’s staff and passed along to Semafor, Tucker said she “absolutely loved Isabella’s piece about your reporter Lichtenberg.” She noted that even among newsroom leaders, there is broad AI resistance and skepticism to AI that neither editor shared. 'I love your totally clear-eyed, unsentimental approach to AI in newsrooms. It makes you pretty unique among our cohort. I just did an All Hands meeting with our APAC staff (I’m in Tokyo) and told them they all had to read it. Anyone who doesn’t get what you are doing at fortune, or thinks it is "wrong," should get out of journalism fast!'”
Image of a press release for the band Goose, including part of a photo the band, in an email sent today.
Mubi alert says: "'Paul F. Tompkins: Driven to Drink' is not available to watch. Instead, check out Dave Fleischer's 'Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor.'"
Quince ad for jean’s showing a woman’s denim-clad crotch and advising shoppers to “snatch some for yourself” – “snatch” having a double meaning as a verb (grab) and noun (including as a vulgar and somewhat archaic term for vagina).
ABC News: “President Donald Trump met Thursday with Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who presented him with her Nobel Peace Prize medal. The president called it a "’wonderful gesture of mutual respect.’"
New York Times headline about Trump dropping the idea that “Cartel de los Soles” is a real organization
A grocery store stand of Open Nature brand Entertaining Crackers (original and multigrain)
New York Times headline: “Popular Chain That Made Cupcakes Très Chic Closes” with text that includes: “Sprinkles Cupcakes, the specialty chain that started out in a private kitchen and grew to fuel a craze for cupcakes sold in bakeries and vending machines that played a song with each sale, is no more. The announcement of the treats going away was made by Candace Nelson, who sold the California-based business to a private equity firm, KarpReilly LLC, in 2012. She said on social media that the company's final day was Dec. 31. Neither she nor the firm explained the reason for the chain's closure.”
A Wealth Tax Floated in California Has Billionaires Thinking of Leaving It's uncertain whether the proposal will reach the November ballot, but some billionaires like Peter Thiel and Larry Page may be unwilling to take the risk.
New York Times headline: “How a Kansas Republican Became Part of a Racist, Antisemitic Group Chat”
New York Times excerpt has Representative Virginia Foxx of North Carolina, who leads the Rules Committee saying “the insinuation that there was mounting ire from women directed at Mr. Johnson was ‘brainless as it is ignorant.’"
An exec at a New York finance executive is quoted in The New York Times as saying "Guys like me are definitely seriously considering making some moves” to leave because Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor.
The El Burrito Supreme #2 truck on the Embarcadero in Oakland, California
A weathered “god bless America” billboard on Fruitvale Avenue in Oakland, California, that through accident or design now actually says just “god bless erica”
New York Times essay headline from the homepage: “It's Not the Autopen. It's What We Don't Know About Biden's Last Days in Office.”
A bright red “pull” sign on a door resting on a jamb and that obviously swings outward for someone to exit.
New York Times except about Trump demanding $230 million for government actions investigating him: “Asked about the issue at the White House after this article first published, the president said, ‘I was damaged very greatly and any money I would get, I would give to charity.’"
A billboard over a Dunkin’ Donuts in Porter Square, Cambridge, for a company apparently called Orkes that says “AI Agents + Humans + APIs, the Agents Workflow Platform”
A clipping from New York Magazine about mayor Eric Adams giving up his run for reelection: "Look at Donald Trump," says one aide. "He left in disgrace, and four years later, he is president of the United States. Anything can happen. This isn't the end of Eric Adams.'”
A waste basket with failed attempts to get stuff in
A Boston Globe magazine blurb saying "We think hallucinations make AI different from us. What if they make us the same?" with the excerpt, "Spinning stories out of nothing is a deeply human impulse. As a neurologist, I see my patients do it all the time" and a link to keep reading.
A Facebook prompt urging me to "make a post for Friday the 13th"
Empty prepared-chicken display racks at Star Market in Porter Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
New York Times excerpt about Trump’s bewildering and deranged foreign policy by tariff: “Just how much things have changed was evident from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to China over the weekend to meet with Xi Jinping, China's top leader. Trade and political relations between India and China have been strained, at times severely, and it was Mr. Modi's first trip there in seven years.”
NYT text that includes the passage "Smothering progressivism produced a populist reaction that eventually descended into a nihilist surge."
New York Times story from A1 today, picking up with a reference to ban on assault weapons and other gun safety laws: “It is a message that politicians on the right have long struggled to rebut, even though the statistics are on their side: mass shootings make up a tiny portion of gun crimes, and recent data from the Gun Violence Archive show that such shootings are falling nearly to prepandemic levels. (There were well over 600 mass shootings annually during the peak pandemic years; more than halfway through 2025, there have been 271.)”
A screen capture from Apple's Messages showing a muted conversation, signified by a bell with a line through it – while next to it the icon you click to choose to mute a conversation has NO line through it.
A screenshot of Wednesday Addams from the Netflix series’ S2E3 saying “I have Fobi. ‘Fear of Being Included.’”
New York Times article says “This lets Android users hold down the power button on their phone to summon Gemini and speak into the microphone to ask it to do things like: • Generate a grocery list for guacamo-le in their notes app. • Look up how long it takes to walk to a local movie theater. • Generate a list of ingredients from a cooking video they are watching on YouTube. “To put it another way, even though the flashiest new part of Android 16 is its colorful interface, the true force driving Android is shaping up to be Gemini.”
A New York Times opinion section front promising to explain “How the Multiracial Left Became the Multiracial Right”
A picture of an intense older man with pursed lips, glaring eyes and long, swept-back hair and wearing prison scrubs over the headline "Joseph Czuba, landlord convicted in murder of Palestinian American boy Wadee Al Fayoumi, dies in prison."
New York Times headline: “Biden Says He Made the Clemency Decisions That Were Recorded With Autopen” Excerpt: “President Trump and his allies have claimed that former President Biden was incapacitated and his staff conspired to take presidential actions in his name.”
New York Times essay by Thomas Friedman saying it’s sad Elon Musk “has discredited himself with so many voters because of his dalliance with Trump and because of his Department of Government Efficiency's capricious cuts to the government work force.“
New York Times headline: “In a Win for Trump, NATO Agrees to a Big Increase in Military Spending”