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August 23, 2025
 

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EDITORIALS
Sep 15, 2009
Rousing children's curiosity
There is concern that Japanese children generally are not as interested in science as they used to be. Although the government has adopted countermeasures, it seems that they are not producing the desired effect.
EDITORIALS
Sep 15, 2009
Rescuing the unemployed
The Democratic Party of Japan-led administration, to be launched shortly, should do whatever it can to improve the employment situation, as both regular and irregular workers are suffering. Government efforts would help put the Japanese economy on a path to recovery.
EDITORIALS
Sep 14, 2009
To build a dam, or not
The Democratic Party of Japan's election manifesto calls for a complete review of large public works projects that fail to respond to the needs of the day, specifically calling for a halt to construction of Kawabe Dam in Kumamoto Prefecture and Yanba Dam in Nagano Prefecture.
EDITORIALS
Sep 14, 2009
Investing in Japan's posterity
Japan's rapidly graying population and shrinking population is casting a shadow on Japan's future. After hitting a low of 1.26 in 2005, the total fertility rate (TFR) has risen for three consecutive years and stood at 1.37 in 2008, a rise of 0.03 from 2007. Nonetheless, deaths still exceed births and...
COMMENTARY
Sep 14, 2009
An advantageous U.S. exit
By Brahma Chellaney
NEW DELHI — America's war in Afghanistan is approaching a tipping point, with doubts about President Barack Obama's strategy rising. Yet, after dispatching 21,000 additional U.S. forces to Afghanistan, Obama is considering sending another 14,000 combat troops there. Let's be clear: America's Afghan...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Sep 13, 2009
Tanikawa: A master of foreign ways and Japan's most accessible poet
By Roger Pulvers
"We must try to explain everything we think to children. . . . Words that are really rooted in the bones of the Japanese people: Those words are accessible."
COMMENTARY
Sep 13, 2009
Political fancies at the Venice Film Festival
By Gautaman Bhaskaran
VENICE — Often great films tell great political stories. Or, at least they unfold against the backdrop of tumultuous political events. "Gone with a Wind" would never let us forget the American Civil War. "Casablanca" was set against the exodus of hundreds of people fleeing Nazi tyranny to the New World....
EDITORIALS
Sep 13, 2009
A vain concealment
There has been a new development in a lawsuit filed by a group of citizens calling on the government to disclose diplomatic documents related to the 1972 reversion of Okinawa from U.S. to Japanese rule. One of the documents concerns an alleged secret financial concession to Washington — a payment by...
COMMENTARY
Sep 13, 2009
Real 'fraternity' with U.S.
By Kazuo Ogoura
Democratic Party of Japan leader Yukio Hatoyama's article on the "Banner of Fraternity" — particularly the part that deals with globalization, Americanism and Japan's relations with her Asian neighbors — has drawn many comments both in Japan and the United States.
EDITORIALS
Sep 13, 2009
DPJ battles the budget
Budget compilation is a big challenge for the new administration of Democratic Party of Japan leader Yukio Hatoyama. The administration has to carry out the task with speed and painstaking care to prevent the economy from plunging into another downturn.
COMMENTARY
Sep 13, 2009
Consequences of fuzzy targets
By Gwynne Dyer
LONDON — Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National Party, is a "soft" fascist who does not rant in the 1930s style. But he came pretty close to the old style two months ago when, newly elected to the European Parliament, he called for "very tough" measures to stop illegal African migrants from...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 13, 2009
'Settlement freeze' a running joke in Israel
By Daoud Kuttab
RAMALLAH, West Bank — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to approve new Jewish settlements on the eve of a possible settlement freeze is the latest round in a cycle that has been repeated so many times over the past 40 years that it would seem mundane if it were not so dangerous....
Japan to revise romanization rules for first time in 70 years
The Agency for Cultural Affairs is recommending replacing the government’s long-standing Kunrei system with more widely used Hepburn-style spellings.
JR East cancels luxury train run over crew's boozing
East Japan Railway said Thursday that it will cancel one trip of a luxury overnight sleeper service, which was originally scheduled to depart from Ueno Station in Tokyo on Aug. 30, after crew members were found to have been drinking alcohol on duty.
Women-only communities flourish in China
Chen Yani (right), nicknamed "Keke," eats lunch with friends and guests in a female co-living space she founded called "Keke's Imaginative Space" in Hangzhou, in eastern China's Zhejiang province, on July 14.
Demystifying the manufacturing success of China
China’s massive scale, strong education system and competitive local governance have enabled it to reach the technological frontier and dominate high-tech manufacturing despite its low per capita gross domestic product.
Infectious diseases to watch for in Japan this summer amid surge of cases
An illustration of a colony of the Bordetella pertussis bacterium that causes pertussis, or whooping cough. As of Aug. 10, there were 64,467 cases reported this year, according to the latest data from the Japan Institute for Health Security.
Is the LDP’s catch-all approach to politics still effective?
Former economic security minister Sanae Takaichi visits Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo on Aug. 15. Political commentator Toru Hashimoto has suggested that Takaichi ought to lead a group of like-minded hawkish politicians out of the Liberal Democratic Party and form their own party.
Fingers sore from too much phone time? You might have ‘sumaho yubi.’
A catch-all term for tendonitis and arthritis caused by excessive smartphone use, 'sumaho yubi' may be difficult to treat for gadget-crazy Japan.
As farm minister, Koizumi is held ‘hostage’ by Ishiba
Farm minister Shinjiro Koizumi (center) attends a Lower House session on Aug. 1. Locking Koizumi into the Cabinet is Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s way of turning a potential rival into a team player, according to one expert.
Big burgers and bigger ambitions for Japan's Burger King
Kazuhiro Nomura, president of BK Japan Holdings, which operates Burger King in Japan
Tokyo crowned No.1 'workation' spot
Workations were a burgeoning trend in the corporate world for years before the COVID-19 pandemic turbocharged it.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past
By Alex K.T. Martin

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