Since the Lam Wai-sze affair broke, people in Hong Kong have begun asking whether chief executive Leung Chun-ying has lost his mind.

The aged Jiang Zemin recently had dinner with the also aged former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. The dinner offered Jiang a moment in the press, as he seeks to a way to reassert his waning influence.

As an international award-winning film director with friends who had once ruled China, Zhang would have seemed to be untouchable. That is the point of the troubles he now faces.

Early in the morning of April 6, a court in China’s coastal Jiangsu Province reversed itself and decided to stop punishing a lawyer for practicing law. That grudging reversal—gained due to protests from lawyers and the public—may be a sign of bigger changes afoot.

An official close to Chinese top leaders says Hu will continue as Chairman of the Central Military.