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Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Jan 1, 2013

Osaka: What are your hopes for yourself, Japan and the world in 2013?

I argue with my husband a lot, so I hope that diminishes next year! And I hope everyone stays healthy, especially my four grandkids and new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, since he previously quit for health reasons. I worry about Japan's conflicts with our neighbors, and hope that the country can use its brainpower and high-tech knowhow to figure out ways to solve the various island disputes. Can't we all just get along nicely?
Japan Times
WORLD
Jan 1, 2013

Guard Afghanistan's most sacred artifact at one's peril

For 250 years, Masood Akhundzada's family has protected Afghanistan's most sacred artifact: a cloak said to have been worn by the Prophet Muhammad. Its power drew Afghan kings and presidents and Taliban leaders to a small, blue shrine in a city conquered by Alexander the Great and contested ever since....
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 31, 2012

2013: Beginning of the U.S. economic recovery?

There is good reason to think that 2013 will finally be the year that the U.S. economic recovery really feels like a recovery: The biggest forces that have been holding the economy back finally seem to be subsiding.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Dec 31, 2012

Supreme copout: twisted justification for guns

Suppose a Seung-Hui Cho, Jared Lee Loughner, James Eagan Holmes or an Adam Lanza shot and killed or seriously wounded any of the families of John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. Would any of them have given different opinions in their 2008 and 2010 decisions?...
BASEBALL / HIT AND RUN
Dec 30, 2012

Matsui should be remembered as one of Japan's best

In 2001 Ichiro Suzuki shattered expectations about what Japanese players could and could not do in Major League Baseball.
EDITORIALS
Dec 30, 2012

2012: a year of low points

For many people in Japan, the past year felt like a doubly busy year. In 2011, life here seemed to be on hold, waiting for the next earthquake, tsunami or radiation disaster. But by the end of 2012, the regular rhythms, worries and needs of the country started to return to normal. The past year was a...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Dec 29, 2012

Textile scholar advocates sustainable fashion

Yoshiko Wada, textile artist and scholar, believes the word "sustainable" in foods and fashion shares the same philosophical taste. "Both are a holistic approach, about health, environment, and the community that supports it. We must recapture and rethink how we are going to sustain our Earth and society,...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 29, 2012

How can Japan help save the world? Be more Taiwanese

Japan had Taiwan under its rule from 1895 until 1945. Despite the history of colonial rule, Taiwanese today have largely favorable views of the Japanese. Japan is the third most popular destination for the Taiwanese, after South Korea and China.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2012

Club crowd uses salsa to slam archaic law

Earlier this month, several people were seen salsa dancing in frigid weather outside bustling Shibuya Station. They weren't there to show off, but to protest what they say is an outdated law that is being used to indiscriminately crack down on their favorite dancing spots.
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2012

Ozawa, Diet cohorts keep party, subsidy, leave Shiga Gov. Kada with Nippon Mirai name only

The shotgun political marriage between Shiga Gov. Yukiko Kada and Diet veteran Ichiro Ozawa was formally annulled Friday night, with both sides promising to respect and work with each other where possible, and with Kada's future in doubt.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Dec 29, 2012

Software firm releases Burmese phrase book

Software developer Daiichi Computer Resource Co. has compiled a book of common Burmese expressions titled "Active Myanmar" that can also be downloaded on cellphones.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / BEST OF 2012
Dec 28, 2012

Comparing notes: What they thought of each other's No. 1

Who says critics are out of touch? At the time of writing, entertainment website Pia's "Satisfaction Ranking" for current films has "Intouchables" at No. 3, and "Argo" No. 2. ("Ninkyo Helper" is No. 1.) Kaori Shoji, Mark Schilling, and Giovanni Fazio got together to chew over their No. 1 picks.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / BEST OF 2012
Dec 28, 2012

Japan's female directors make a strong showing

Female Japanese directors were once like those rare species periodically discovered in Asian jungles and immediately labeled endangered. This year, however, in their highly individual ways, they made some of Japan's strongest, most ambitious films. By now the only thing endangered is local industry prejudice...
JAPAN
Dec 28, 2012

Nippon Mirai breaks up as Ozawa, allies veer off

The members of Nippon Mirai no To (Tomorrow Party of Japan) agreed Thursday to split the antinuclear party as strife emerged over who should lead it following its meltdown in the Dec. 16 Lower House election.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 28, 2012

CIA's security group emerges from shadows

FOCUS
JAPAN
Dec 27, 2012

LDP boss urges unity, break with factionalism

After romping back to power following three years in the opposition, the Liberal Democratic Party chief called for unity and a break with tradition Wednesday in a bid to consolidate power ahead of the Upper House election in July.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Dec 27, 2012

Social awareness takes center stage

Japan's calamities of March 2011 — the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami, and the start of an ongoing nuclear disaster — changed not only the social awareness of the general public who make up theater audiences, but also how dramatists approached their work. Many questioned why so many mistakes...
Reader Mail
Dec 27, 2012

Living in the here and now

Regarding the Rev. William L. Bulson's letter of Dec. 23: Bulson's overriding concern with the tragic Newtown, Connecticut, massacre seems to betray a certain double standard.
BUSINESS
Dec 27, 2012

Best yen analysts join skepticism of Abe

Shinzo Abe's return to the post of prime minister has fueled speculation his stimulus policies will extend the yen's biggest drop since 2005. Domestic companies and the best currency forecasters aren't so sure.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 26, 2012

Corporate short-termism in the fiscal cliff's shadow

Economic trends are sometimes more closely related to one another than news reports make them seem. For example, one regularly encounters reports of governments' financial troubles, like the "fiscal cliff" in the United States and the debt crisis in Europe. And much attention has been devoted, often...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2012

Kaieda takes DPJ helm; Ozawa overture hinted

The Democratic Party of Japan picked former trade minister Banri Kaieda as its new president Tuesday, a sign that the party may seek to join hands with Ichiro Ozawa, a former DPJ leader who left the party earlier this year, for the upcoming Upper House election.
COMMUNITY / Issues / LIGHT GIST
Dec 25, 2012

The year in quotes: 25 windows on the way things were in 2012

It was a year dominated by Japan's spats with its most powerful neighbors, China and South Korea, over tiny specks in the sea, and by national soul-searching over nuclear power and the calamity that struck Japan in March 2011. It ended with the stunning political resurrection of the Liberal Democratic...
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Dec 25, 2012

Home air conditioning in U.S. cut deaths on hot days: study

As winter begins to tighten its grip over much of the United States, air conditioning does not seem like much of a survival strategy. But a new study has found that home air conditioning played a key role in reducing American death rates over the past half-century, by keeping people cool on extremely...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 24, 2012

Don't confuse mental illness with evil incarnate

As a baby reporter in Texas, I covered what we euphemistically called mental health services in the state. These "services," reserved for the dangerously ill, involved brief, groggy hospital stays followed up with a handshake, script for enough pills to stun a moose, and best wishes: See you soon!
COMMENTARY / World / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Dec 24, 2012

Power industry outlasts DPJ

Nobody was more pleased than the electric power industry when Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda made the surprise announcement Nov. 14 that he would dissolve the Lower House and call a general election. The industry hoped that this would clear the way for terminating the rule of Noda's Democratic Party of...

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years