Category: Uncategorized

CNN
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Jeremy Renner is continuing his recovery after his devastating snowplow accident in January, and recognizing those who’ve helped him along the way.

The “Rennervations” star posted to the Stories portion of his verified Instagram account ahead of the weekend, showing his recent visit to Renown Regional Medical Center, a Reno, Nevada hospital.

“I got to revisit the amazing group of people who saved my life,” Renner, 52, wrote over a photo of himself posing in the center of a group of people standing in front of a screen that displayed the words “Welcome back!”

He included two other photos with staffers from the medical center, including one outside in front of a Renown sign.

Renner was crushed by a snowplow on New Year’s Day near his Nevada home while trying to clear snow for a relative, and broke several bones including eight ribs, an eye socket, a knee and shoulder. His liver was also pierced, and one of his lungs collapsed.

Last week, the “Hawkeye” star made his first red carpet appearance since the life-threatening incident, for the premiere of his Disney+ series “Rennervations.”

In the show, he and his team help refurbish and repurpose service vehicles to help communities and children in need.

Three episodes are currently streaming, with a fourth, set in India, to premiere soon.

Editor’s Note: The following contains major spoilers about the fourth episode of “Succession’s” fourth season, “Honeymoon States.”

CNN
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After the shock came the aftershocks, the power vacuum, and perhaps most significantly and impressively, the laughs, as “Succession” pivoted to face life after Logan Roy, in an episode that finally put the HBO show’s title into full flower.

Logan Roy’s abrupt demise left his grown children and subordinates scrambling, with each seemingly humbly offering themselves up to fill the void, while fretting about how the various candidates would play with the company’s board.

At the same time, they mourned the larger-than-life figure they had lost, taking into account that he had treated many of them abysmally. And the fourth hour also marked the return of Logan’s wife, Marcia (Hiam Abbass), in what felt like “Marcia Strikes Back,” while his current and much younger girlfriend, Kerri (Zoe Winter), was bluntly shown the door. (The latter evoked memories of the musical “Evita,” when the title character boots Peron’s mistress, who sings about another suitcase in another hall.)

More than anything, the episode underscored just how brutally funny “Succession” can be, with Shiv (Sarah Snook) reading her father’s obituary and musing, “Dad sounds amazing. I would like to have met dad,” while brothers Kendall (Jeremy Strong) and Roman (Kieran Culkin) hilariously translated the language, with references to Logan having been “a man of his time” equaling “racist.”

The episode also showcased the executives at Waystar Royco, who uncomfortably wondered what to do with a document that included not only Logan’s posthumous wishes but hand-written notes that seemingly specified who he wished to succeed him. They joked, feebly, about tossing the paper in the toilet, while making very clear how much they really wanted to toss the paper in the toilet.

All the knives came out, with Carl (David Rasche) brutally insulting Tom (Matthew Macfadyen), scarcely hiding behind the fact that he was presenting the doubts about Tom’s future as a hypothetical.

Amid that, though, there were also human moments, with the tortured Kendall articulating his conflicted feelings to Waystar executive Frank (Peter Friedman) by saying, “He made me hate him, and he died. I feel like he didn’t like me. I disappointed him.”

“Succession” also underscored the fragility of not just life, but a corporate legacy, with the public-relations folk discussing how to spin and diminish Logan’s involvement in his later years as a means of bucking up the company and its stock price – a maneuver that Kendall ultimately and surreptitiously approved, concluding that it was the sort of smart and ruthless move that his father would have executed.

Questions of succession also appear to be threatening the harmony achieved by Kendall, Shiv and Roman prior to Logan’s exit, with Shiv being left as the odd woman out in a plan to fill the CEO seat just long enough to close the sale to GoJo. Trust doesn’t come easily in series creator Jesse Armstrong’s world, and when Shiv said, “I need to wet my beak,” the assurances from her brothers clearly left the impression how easily that beak could wind up bent out of joint.

Ultimately, after the operating highs of the previous episode, the series successfully turned the page from grieving to the next order of business. And that too, as Kendall put it regarding Logan and the “bad dad” PR leaks, is “what he would do.”

Editor’s Note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” Follow him @DeanObeidallah@masto.ai. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion on CNN.

CNN
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On Monday, the GOP-controlled House Judiciary Committee — chaired by Donald Trump ally Rep. Jim Jordan — is set to hold a field hearing in New York City called “Victims of Violent Crime in Manhattan.” A statement bills the hearing as an examination of how, the Judiciary Committee says, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s policies have “led to an increase in violent crime and a dangerous community for New York City residents.”

In response, Bragg’s office slammed Jordan’s hearing as “a political stunt” while noting that data released by the New York Police Department shows crime is down in Manhattan with respect to murders, burglaries, robberies and more through April 2, compared with the same period last year.

In reality, this Jordan-led hearing isn’t about stopping crime but about defending Trump — who was recently charged by a Manhattan grand jury with 34 felonies. Trump pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges stemming from an investigation into a hush-money payment to an adult film actress. The former president also is facing criminal probes in other jurisdictions over efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

Bragg sued Jordan and his committee last week in federal court, accusing the Judiciary Committee chairman of a “transparent campaign to intimidate and attack” his office for its investigation and prosecution of Trump by making demands for confidential documents and testimony.

While Jordan and his committee appear focused on discrediting the investigation into Trump, why aren’t they looking into two recent bombshell reports by ProPublica that raised red flags about Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ financial relationship with GOP megadonor Harlan Crow? After all, the House Judiciary Committee’s website explains that it has jurisdiction over “matters relating to the administration of justice in federal courts” – for which the revelations concerning Thomas fit perfectly.

First, we learned in early April that Crow had provided Thomas and his wife, Ginni, for decades with luxurious vacations including on the donor’s yacht and private jet to faraway places such as Indonesia and New Zealand. That information was never revealed to the public. (In a rare public statement, Thomas responded he was advised at the time that he did not have to report the trips. The justice said the guidelines for reporting personal hospitality have changed recently. “And, it is, of course, my intent to follow this guidance in the future,” he said.)

Then on Thursday, ProPublica reported that Thomas failed to disclose a 2014 real estate deal involving the sale of three properties he and his family owned in Savannah, Georgia, to that same GOP megadonor, Crow. One of Crow’s companies made the purchases for $133,363, according to ProPublica. A federal disclosure law passed after Watergate requires Supreme Court justices and other officials to make public the details of most real estate sales over $1,000.

As ProPublica detailed, the federal disclosure form Thomas filed for that year included a space to report the identity of the buyer in any private transaction, but Thomas left that space blank. Four ethics law experts told ProPublica that Thomas’ failure to report it appears to be a violation of the law. (Thomas did not respond to questions from ProPublica on its report; CNN reached out to the Supreme Court and Thomas for comment.)

The House Judiciary Committee has long addressed issues such as those surrounding Thomas. In fact, the committee is where investigations and the impeachment of federal judges often commence.

One recent example came in 2010 with Judge G. Thomas Porteous Jr., whom the committee investigated and recommended for impeachment.

The committee’s Task Force on Judicial Impeachment said evidence showed Porteous “intentionally made material false statements and representations under penalty of perjury, engaged in a corrupt kickback scheme, solicited and accepted unlawful gifts, and intentionally misled the Senate during his confirmation proceedings.” The Senate later found Porteous guilty of four articles of impeachment and removed him from the bench.

Yet the Judiciary Committee has neither released statements nor tweets raising alarm bells about Thomas. Instead, its Twitter feed is filled with repeated tweets whining that C-SPAN won’t cover Monday’s New York field hearing. Worse, the committee retweeted GOP Rep. Mary Miller’s tweet defending Thomas as being attacked “because he is a man of deep faith, who loves our country and believes in our Constitution.”

Jordan’s use of his committee to assist Trump should surprise no one. The House January 6 committee’s report called the Ohio Republican “a significant player in President Trump’s efforts” to overturn the election. The report detailed the lawmaker’s efforts to assist Trump including on “January 2, 2021, Representative Jordan led a conference call in which he, President Trump, and other Members of Congress discussed strategies for delaying the January 6th joint session.” As a result, the January 6 committee subpoenaed Jordan to testify — but he refused to cooperate.

In contrast with the House panel, the Senate Judiciary Committee — headed by Democrats — announced in the wake of the reporting on Thomas that it plans to hold a hearing “on the need to restore confidence in the Supreme Court’s ethical standards.” Beyond that, Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Rep. Hank Johnson of Georgia sent a letter Friday calling for a referral of Thomas to the US attorney general over “potential violations of the Ethics in Government Act 1978.”

The House Judiciary Committee’s website notes, “The Committee on the Judiciary has been called the lawyer for the House of Representatives.” Under Jordan that description needs to be updated to state that the Committee on the Judiciary is now “the lawyer for Donald J. Trump.” And the worst part is that the taxpayers are the ones paying for Jordan’s work on Trump’s behalf.