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Reader Mail

Mar 26, 2014

A sideshow to the main events

I have written before that I think the Olympic Games are a sideshow to the world championships for each event. The world championships, not the Olympics, by definition are where we see the best. Jack Gallagher thinks otherwise in his March 19 column "Worlds better held before Olympics as a qualifier."...

Reader Mail

Mar 26, 2014

A gap that is destroying the U.S.

I was fascinated to read Andrew Sheldon's March 23 letter, "Let's celebrate the progress of the few wealthy." His theory that we would all be better off without government is so absurd that I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Reader Mail

Mar 26, 2014

Employ foreigners as educators

Regarding the March 22 article "Break 'passive' English effort": Perry Akins, chairman of Boston Educational Services, is reported to have cited the teaching of only material to be tested as the main problem hindering English communication and efforts to foster global talent among Japanese youth. In...

COMMENTARY / Japan / SENTAKU MAGAZINE

Mar 21, 2014

Cracks in the ruling coalition

The exercise of Japan's right to collective self-defense has become Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's political creed, but ruling coalition partner New Komeito wants Abe to slow his approach, and others close to Abe have grown apprehensive about the rise of anti-American conservatism within Abe's Liberal Democratic Party. The ruling coalition is showing cracks.

Reader Mail

Mar 21, 2014

DNA test on ashes often unreliable

The March 17 front-page article "Yokota's parents, child meet" states that DNA tests conducted in Japan on cremated remains from North Korea in 2004 "disproved" that the remains were of Megumi Yokota (abducted by North Korean agents in 1977).

Japan Times

JAPAN / Media / NET NEWS WATCH

Mar 20, 2014

Did Japan's hallowed cherry trees actually originate in South Korea?

Did Japan’s hallowed cherry trees actually originate South Korea?

LIFE / Japan Showcase / AOMORI PREFECTURE

Mar 20, 2014

Walking among the snow monsters of the Hakkoda mountains

The cable car rumbles ominously as it carries us from the station in Towada-HachimantaiNational Park up to the peak of Mount Tamoyachi, in the northern Hakkoda mountain range. The dozens of goggled skiers and snowboarders filling the floating glass chamber hardly seem to hear it, as they eagerly approach...

BUSINESS / Companies

Mar 19, 2014

Toyota set to pay $1.2 billion to settle U.S. criminal probe

Toyota Motor Corp. has reached a settlement to end a U.S. criminal probe of sudden unexpected acceleration of its vehicles, three people familiar with the matter said.

Japan Times

WORLD / Politics

Mar 19, 2014

Crimea welcomed 'home'

On March 16, Crimeans voted to leave Ukraine and become a part of Russia. While the politicians exchange their statements and the West prepares economic sanctions against Russia, the people are expressing themselves on social media

Reader Mail

Mar 19, 2014

Fukushima's history of struggle

One victim of Fukushima's nuclear disaster has been quoted as saying: "Our present anti-nuclear movement is similar to the one for democracy that our ancestors waged during the Meiji Era. While their dream for democracy didn't come true, their will has been handed down to us."

Reader Mail

Mar 19, 2014

Job hunters present a sorry sight

Recently we've seen a lot of young job hunters in new suits, and many of them seem not to have gotten accustomed to wearing them yet. It is a pity that some of them behave so clumsily under pressures they have never experienced before.

Reader Mail

Mar 19, 2014

Putin's 'red line' trumps Obama's

Gregory Clark's March 11 article, "Contradictions over Crimea," and Kevin Rafferty's March 12 article, "Ukraine batters a broken world," are like two sides of the Crimea coin and very helpful to the reader for showing a three-dimensional picture of the crisis rather than the single dimension filtered...

Reader Mail

Mar 19, 2014

Shorter patent exam is welcome

As an intellectual property counsel, the March 13 Jiji article titled "Japan aims to cut patent exam lengths in half" caught my eye. Unfortunately the on-line article did not link to an underlying copy of any press release or to a synopsis of the related bill that the Abe administration has presented...

Reader Mail

Mar 19, 2014

The desire to end a horrible war

I must respectfully disagree with Yoshio Shimoji's March 13 letter, "Few American casualties" (which was a reply to my March 6 letter ("Japan wouldn't even save its own"). His facts are a bit off, but as only a brief reply is allowed here, I'll provide the following outline:

Reader Mail

Mar 19, 2014

Worst lay ahead for much of Asia

In the March 13 letter "Expansionism allied with racism," Faith Bach refutes my claim that the often-made comparison between German and Japanese World War II aggression has flaws in that the war in Asia was between imperial powers while the war in Europe was between sovereign states.

Reader Mail

Mar 15, 2014

Western products might look better

Another word for xenophobia, of course, is racism. (Just look at the photo for the March 9 article.) What's so "normal" about anti-foreigner rhetoric and hate speech in an island nation dependent on international trade for its economic well-being, even for its daily bread?

CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF

Mar 14, 2014

A single mother's 'big family'; profile of Toyota's founder; CM of the week: Hyoketsu Strong

Each of the major networks have at least one "big family" they follow in fly-on-the-wall fashion over a period of years to yield two specials per annum. With their reality-show veneer of the joys and sorrows of raising a lot of kids, these shows are guaranteed ratings monsters.

Reader Mail

Mar 12, 2014

Expansionism allied with racism

Regarding Paul de Vries' March 6 letter, "The crimes of an imperial power": De Vries' attempt to dissociate Japan and Germany during World War II is based on a less-than-complete understanding of Adolf Hitler's war, which was a unified, flagrantly imperialist-expansionist push, exactly as Japan's venture...

Reader Mail

Mar 12, 2014

Few American civilian casualties

Regarding the March 6 letters by Barry Andrew Ward ("U.S. actions much less egregious") and by James Hughes ("Japan wouldn't even save its own"): Maybe we are talking about atrocities of different kinds and on different levels.

Reader Mail

Mar 12, 2014

Reasons for dropping the bomb

Regarding Barry Andrew Ward's March 6 letter, "U.S. actions much less egregious": I'd like to add my two pence worth.

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

After the asset-price bubble crash of the early 1990s, employment at a Japanese company was no longer necessarily for life. As a result, a new generation is less willing to endure a toxic work culture —life’s too short, after all.

How Japan's youth are slowly changing the country's work ethic

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

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