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JAPAN
Aug 28, 2012

DPJ fix for vote-value gap wins panel nod

The ruling Democratic Party of Japan voted Monday in an opposition-boycotted Lower House committee to back its legislation aimed at rectifying the national disparity in vote values, which is threatening the constitutionality of Japan's elections.
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2012

Growth argument stretched thin

Regarding Takamitsu Sawa's Aug. 20 article "Measuring a society's value": I find the article confusing as Sawa seems to be trying to relate the "well fed, well bred" slogan to economic growth.
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2012

Don't be shy about drinking up

Regarding Greg Blossom's Aug. 16 letter, "Wasteful ways to quench thirst": Putting pressure on people to hydrate "less wastefully" is more of the same sadomasochistic pressure Japanese people are already under to bear up under the heat. Thirty-nine people are reported to have died of heatstroke in July....
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2012

Military brothels go way back

Study world history. European powers and others kept "comfort women" or legitimate military brothels into the 20th century. In the 1970s, there were separate brothels in South Korea for American forces and for Katusas (Koreans attached to the U.S. Army).
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2012

Infeasible retirement proposal

Regarding the Aug. 22 article "What if no-benefit 'retirement' age is set at 40?": Mandatory retirement at 40 would hit around the age when many people have families with small children. Japan already has a huge problem with low birthrates. I imagine that the prospect of losing one's job just when family...
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2012

Let Hashimoto show his evidence

Regarding the Aug. 23 front-page article "No evidence sex slaves were taken by military: Hashimoto": Although there is overwhelming evidence that Japan forcibly used "comfort women" during its brutal occupation of Korea, Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto has revealed his abhorrent character by suggesting that...
CULTURE / Books
Aug 26, 2012

Another strange tale from east of the river

River Road: a Novel of Six Stories, by Hillel Wright. Printed Matter Press, 2012, 146 pp., $15.00 (hardcover) Writer Hillel Wright's seedbed of ideas, fertilized in the work of American giants like Ken Kesey, Tom Wolfe and William Burroughs, also owes something to the English sci-fi writer Michael Moorcock....
Japan Times
LIFE
Aug 26, 2012

Material girls: Japan's preteen model boom

AKB48 has reshaped the landscape of youth culture in modern Japan. The pop-idol group's rapid rise to stardom across a wide array of formats has provided the country's children with a fairly straightforward path to commercial success: fame is ultimately achieved by attracting a broad fan base via popular...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 25, 2012

A middle class may be welling up in Myanmar

Just last month I made my first visit to Myanmar, a place Rudyard Kipling referred to as "quite unlike any land you know about". While decades of isolation have helped this century-old observation hold true, on arrival in July I was immediately struck by the vibrancy and a palpable sense of change in...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 25, 2012

Death with dignity bills heading toward Diet

It was 2 a.m. when Chiaki rushed to the hospital to see her 63-year-old father, who had collapsed from a ruptured aortic aneurysm.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Aug 25, 2012

Moyes deserves shot with big club

David Moyes accepted the praise and plaudits in his typically unassuming manner.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 24, 2012

Poorer people passing up cancer screenings

The lower your income, the less likely you'll take advantage of your local cancer screening program.
JAPAN
Aug 24, 2012

Brother keeps Sadako memory alive

Masahiro Sasaki was only 4 years old when the B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped its atomic bomb on Hiroshima, wiping out the central part of the city on that sunny Aug. 6, 1945, morning.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 24, 2012

'Anata e (Dearest)'

To call Ken Takakura an icon is almost an understatement. He is not only one of the few stars left from the heyday of the studio era, but he has for decades embodied the sort of ideal Japanese male (stoic, self-sacrificing, unstoppable in a fight) who is vanishingly rare in real life. (Clint Eastwood...
JAPAN
Aug 24, 2012

Serbia looking for more contact, ambassador says

Serbia wants the Japanese people to learn more about the country, whose diplomatic contacts with Japan date back 130 years, Ambassador to Japan Bojana Adamovic Dragovic said Thursday.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Aug 24, 2012

Ashby makes Rizing Fukuoka fifth team in Japan career

Another season, another team for Julius Ashby.
EDITORIALS
Aug 24, 2012

Death of an experienced journalist

Ms. Mika Yamamoto, a video journalist belonging to the Tokyo-based independent media group The Japan Press, was killed on Monday while covering the conflict in Syria between government and rebel forces in Aleppo.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 24, 2012

'Prometheus'

My high school English teacher once assigned an essay on Ken Kesey's "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." She was pushing the idea that the novel was one big Jesus allegory, with its hero McMurphy dying for the salvation of the other patients, but I couldn't agree. Kesey had worked in a mental institution,...
Reader Mail
Aug 23, 2012

More important than fast cars

Regarding Stewart Tennyson's Aug. 16 letter, "Why give geothermal short shrift?": I totally agree that industries would prefer to focus on bigger networks and generators rather than on alternative energy.
Reader Mail
Aug 23, 2012

Defending Keynesian economics

Reading Stephen Shaw's long Aug. 19 letter, "Noda tempts economic disaster," one has to wonder whether Shaw has ever had a course in history or in economics.
Reader Mail
Aug 23, 2012

Who's letting the tail wag the dog?

According to the Aug. 17 Kyodo article "Osprey crash in April due to pilot error: U.S.": Former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage is reported to have urged Tokyo to deal with the issues of U.S. Osprey aircraft deployment and Futenma air base relocation from the wider security perspective...
Reader Mail
Aug 23, 2012

Ray of hope from Noda's words

I read through the Aug. 16 front-page article "Two Cabinet Ministers visit Yasukuni," expecting to be dismayed and angered in equal measure. There was one ray of hope and, all the more surprisingly, it came from Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda himself.
Reader Mail
Aug 23, 2012

Give a flicker of respect to fans

Giovanni Fazio's Aug. 17 review of the film "The Avengers" gave me a headache. I was expecting a well-thought-out critique on the movie, but all I remember reading was "the best actors of my generation" are running around acting like children!
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Aug 23, 2012

Crying Nut and Yellow Monsters

As K-pop continues its rise in stature, South Korea's small but prolific indie scenes are beginning to gain some recognition abroad as well.
Reader Mail
Aug 23, 2012

India needs U.S., Israel as allies

The analyses in Louise O'Brien's Aug. 19 letter, "India should not look to NATO," and in Ramesh Thakur's Aug. 15 article, "India and Pakistan: Come and dream with me," are wrong. As an ethnic Indian, Thakur especially should know the history of India since the seventh century, when Muslims first invaded...
SOCCER / J. League / J. LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Aug 23, 2012

Slow and steady rise gives Sanfrecce upper hand in title race

There will be many more twists and turns before this season's J. League title is won, but after opening up a four-point gap at the top of the table, the balance of power is steadily shifting Sanfrecce Hiroshima's way.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 23, 2012

The Khitans: from Mongolic tribe to rulers of an empire

When I visited "The Splendor of the Khitan Dynasty" at the University Art Museum, Tokyo, I got a funny feeling that Japan somehow wanted to preserve good diplomatic relations with this mighty Empire. This makes perfectly good sense given this state's great military strength and strategic position in...

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
Rethinking that second drink: Japan’s Gen Z gets ‘sober curious’