Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Good morning. It's Tuesday, December 16th. I'm Gideon Resnick in for Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today. On today's show, the conviction of a major figure in Hong Kong's pro-democracy movement. Why dollar store prices aren't always what they seem. And victims at Brown University are remembered and mourned.
But first, to the deaths of filmmaker Rob Reiner and his wife, photographer Michelle Singer Reiner. Yesterday, the Los Angeles Police Department said they made an arrest in the case, one of Reiner's sons. Here's LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell.
We have our Robbery Homicide Division handling the investigation. They worked throughout the night on this case and were able to take into custody Nick Reiner, a suspect in this case. He was subsequently booked for murder and is being held on $4 million bail. Pretty much that's what I can share at this point, but again, a very, very tragic incident.
The case now goes to the L.A. County District Attorney's Office today. While many details remain unconfirmed or unaddressed by authorities, tributes poured in for Reiner yesterday, including everyone from former President Obama to Stephen King. The range of voices highlighted Reiner's iconic standing in American culture.
He was an actor on the sitcom All in the Family and the director of movies like The Princess Bride, This is Spinal Tap, and When Harry Met Sally. But also, Reiner's years supporting progressive politics and the Democratic Party.
The Los Angeles Times notes that Reiner was a co-founder of the American Foundation for Equal Rights, which successfully mounted the effort to overturn Proposition 8, a ballot measure in California that banned same-sex marriage.
In an interview with the outlet Midas Touch on Monday, California's Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom reflected on his relationship with Reiner, who he said supported him during his time as mayor of San Francisco.
I was out there feeling a little alone doing same-sex marriage in 2004. It was Rob who reached out. That's how I got to know him, saying he had my back at a time when a lot of members of my own party, the Democratic Party, didn't. And so he's been a friend for decades. He actually was co-host on an event that I'm doing later this week.
So it just breaks my heart. Newsom is referring to the time when he defied California state law to allow for same-sex marriages. In recent years, Reiner was an extremely harsh critic of President Trump, calling him, quote, mentally unfit at one point and saying that the atmosphere under the administration's leadership is, quote, beyond McCarthy-era-esque.
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Chapter 2: What happened to filmmaker Rob Reiner and his wife?
Do you stand by that post?
Well, I wasn't a fan of his at all. He was a deranged person as far as Trump is concerned.
Yesterday, fans laid flowers at Reiner's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. One note read, RIP Meathead, referencing Reiner's role as Michael Stivic, the liberal student and Archie Bunker's son-in-law on All in the Family. In a 60 Minutes interview earlier this year, Reiner talked about landing that role for Norman Lear's show and his dad's reaction to it.
Norman Lear was the first person that got me. I mean, I was playing Jax with his daughter. Norman says to my dad, you know, this kid is really funny. My dad said, well, that kid, that kid, he's sullen. He sits quiet. He doesn't, you know, he's not funny. He didn't think I was anyway.
Many would come to disagree with that. Yesterday, one of the leaders of Hong Kong's pro-democracy movement was convicted on charges of sedition and collusion under the country's national security laws. The trial was described as a, quote, cruel judicial farce by Human Rights Watch.
78-year-old media tycoon Jimmy Lai now faces the possibility of life in prison after he was found guilty of using his popular newspaper to collude with foreign forces against the interests of Hong Kong and China. He pleaded not guilty to all the charges. The national security law that was used against Lai was imposed by Beijing in 2020 as part of a crackdown against anti-government protests.
The judge in the case said that Lai harbored resentment and hatred for China and concluded that Lai was the mastermind of conspiracies designed to undermine the regime. Lai had the chance to flee Hong Kong, but stayed to fight the accusations in court. Speaking from his home in 2020, he reflected on his journey to the BBC.
This is just living my life peacefully. If I'm in jail, I'm living my life meaningfully. I come here with one dollar. I got everything I have because of this place. If this is the payback time, this is my redemption.
For critics, Lai's conviction demonstrates Beijing's brutal intolerance for the freedom of expression that was once a core part of Hong Kong's cultural identity. Tom Grundy is the editor-in-chief of Hong Kong Free Press, a donor-funded outlet launched to provide independent journalism for its residents. He spoke to us about the trial and its implications.
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Chapter 3: How did Rob Reiner influence American culture and politics?
But even though the discounts are there, the total at checkout can sometimes be a surprise. The Guardian investigated this trend across the country and found that a combination of understaffing, poor inventory controls, and misleading sales pricing is causing many people to overpay. Jocelyn Zuckerman, one of the reporters on the story, spoke to us about it.
We found that since January of 2022, Dollar General failed more than 4,300 government price accuracy inspections in 23 states. Over the same period, Family Dollar failed more than 2,100 in 20 states, some of them with error rates as high as 76%.
These inspections are part of a regulatory process that involves state government employees who are quite literally sometimes carrying a laptop and a scanner gun, like the one that you might see at a checkout. They look to see how different the labeled cost is for an item versus its cost at checkout, and if the price tags are out of date.
Failed inspections have led to major fines or expensive legal settlements, but that hasn't always delivered much improvement.
Even in the states where they've been fined, it continues to happen. So in November 2023, Family Dollar settled with the attorney general of Wisconsin, paid $850,000. Within the next 23 months, Dollar General stores had failed 31% of inspections and Family Dollar failed 30%.
And just last week, Dollar General said it had agreed to pay more than $1.5 million after the Pennsylvania attorney general found that the store was overcharging customers in the state. Neither Family Dollar nor Dollar General agreed to interviews with The Guardian. In statements, they said they were committed to providing customers with price accuracy.
And Dollar General noted its employees were empowered to correct mistakes at the register. According to lawsuits, experts, and employees, overpricing often stems from a labor issue within the stores. When prices change, registers get automatically updated. But the listed prices on the shelves require staffers to manually replace them.
You might see a pack of laundry detergent on the shelf, and the shelf price says $4, and then you get up to the register and you might be charged $5.50. And that's largely because the new price just hasn't been updated on the shelf yet, but it's already reflected in the system.
That difference in cost can be critical for shoppers that have fixed budgets and rely on these stores in their communities. And finally, a few other stories we're following. A JetBlue flight traveling over the Caribbean narrowly avoided a midair collision with a U.S. military aircraft near the Venezuelan coast on Friday.
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