1.
“What the Right Found on Hunter Biden’s Laptop,” September 12–25
For New York’s latest cover story, Andrew Rice and Olivia Nuzzi investigated the origins of a certain MacBook. Megyn Kelly Show executive producer Steve Krakauer called it “meticulous, comprehensive, and insanely interesting.” The New York Times’ Kenneth P. Vogel wrote that the story “raised tricky questions about social media suppression, digital custody chains, disinformation claims & the press’s handling of the above. But it also shows just how thoroughly one person’s life can be exposed by their data.” For Fox News, Brian Flood noted that “New York Magazine is the latest mainstream media outlet to take Hunter Biden’s scandalous laptop seriously” after the device’s contents were initially “dismissed as unreliable and even Russian disinformation by mainstream print and television outlets, especially MSNBC and CNN.” But on The Majority Report, host Sam Seder argued, “They have yet to sort of show how this implicates Joe Biden at all … People can harp about how this information was suppressed and this influenced the election except for there’s nothing in there that reflects on Joe Biden.” On his radio program, Michael Smerconish countered that the story is “worthy of all of our time and attention”: “How do we protect against a scenario where because information comes from such partisan forces, it’s discounted? It’s either accepted or it’s discounted … How do we make sure that the next time there’s something like this, it gets a fair airing?”
2.
“Voyage of the Gross,” September 12–25
Justin Davidson explored what happens to the city’s 12,000 daily tons of trash. Bruno Fonseca said it was “great” journalism “on a problem most of us just forget about,” and Anne Whiting called it a “beautiful piece about some less than beautiful truths.” @Sallan_Found wrote, “This 2022 saga of NYC trash could have been written 10 years ago (let’s call this Zero Progress on Zero Waste) + could easily be reprinted + unchanged in 2032.” Jeremy Sabella added, “This morbidly fascinating piece … throws the challenges of collective action and the staggering consequences of sloth into sharp relief.” As part of this feature, Clio Chang joined Department of Sanitation workers for two days to learn how they are trained (“I Went to Trash School”). The Bulwark’s Martyn Wendell Jones appreciated the article’s “delightful” details, such as how the employees “come to learn the most popular coffee flavors in the city each month from the smell given off by compacted trash ‘juice.’ ” Secki P. Jose tweeted, “Fascinating insights … And a hat tip to the 1968 strike, the benefits of which the workers defended and continue to gain benefit from.”
3.
“Night Terrors,” September 12–25
Laura Hazard Owen wrote about how the internet metastasized the age-old debate over sleep training. Kitchen Medicine author Debi Lewis wrote, “This article is an amazing masterpiece of why having children and needing to sleep is so bonkers hard, but the tl;dr is this: There are no rules. There are no norms. There is just you and your kid(s) and what you can both tolerate and still survive.” And Chalkbeat co-founder and CEO Elizabeth Green tweeted, “If you are a parent or know a parent, I have definitely gotten you hooked on @laurahazardowen’s parenting writing. Which is why you don’t need me to tell you that the only complaint you’ll have with her latest is wishing it didn’t end.” Isabelle Duchaine wrote, “In my experience: the major difference I’ve noticed between families that sleep train and those that don’t is who is available to hang out after 7:30 p.m.” The CBC’s Pete Evans added, “Full disclosure: We sleep trained our kiddo at five months, and while we have had several setbacks along the way, he sleeps pretty normally. I literally cannot comprehend how anyone survives with any other system.” @marieisabel510 wrote, “The need to sleep train says more about the lack of support mothers receive here in the US, and the demands the western world imposes upon families in order to support the economy.” Cassandra Stone added, “Excellent piece. It also reminds me why I want to throat-chop western parents who cite eastern sleep practices, because those people have a village and a centuries-old system that works. We have to be back at work before we’re done bleeding. There, boom, end of debate.” And Emma Wallace said, “This furthers my theory that people will approach any aspect of parenting with a religious fanaticism that would make Torquemada look irresolute.”
Send correspondence to [email protected]. Or go to nymag.com to respond to individual stories.