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COMMENTARY
Sep 22, 2007

Thought Iraq was about oil? Guess again

LONDON — Australia's defense minister, Brendan Nelson, is not the sharpest tool in the box, so people were not really surprised in July when he blurted out that the real motive for invading Iraq was oil:
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 14, 2007

The guitar skeptic

For a guy who's routinely credited with revolutionizing the sound of jazz, Pat Metheny sounds surprisingly detached from his mode of musical expression.
COMMENTARY
Sep 11, 2007

Scaremongering about China, as usual

LOS ANGELES — It might almost seem like a game of geopolitical chicken: How far can we go in creating monstrous new fears about China?
EDITORIALS
Sep 3, 2007

The truth about Myanmar

Myanmar's democrats continue to struggle to be heard. After a series of protests around the country, the military junta has deployed street toughs to rough up anyone who dares take to the streets to demonstrate. The military's over-reaction indicates how brittle its rule is, how fearful it is of any...
BUSINESS / THE VIEW FROM EUROPE
Sep 3, 2007

Merkel to Japan: Leading G8 not only about environment

Last week's visit to Japan by German Chancellor Angela Merkel gave Prime Minister Shinzo Abe a sobering lesson in G8 politics. Germany currently holds the G8 presidency but will pass the baton to Japan in January.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Aug 29, 2007

Let's (try to) get serious about silliness

August is known as the "silly season" in the media in the United States and the United Kingdom, as newspaper editors faced with legislators all gone on holiday struggle in vain to fill their pages and resort to, well, silly stories.
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2007

What about shootings in Japan?

The timing of Hiroaki Sato's article leaves something to be desired. Sato asks why Americans can't give up their guns, yet a Japan Times front-page article on the same day ("Gang boss shot hours after rival gunned down," Aug. 20) is about two yakuza shootings. Why can't the Japanese give up their...
Reader Mail
Aug 15, 2007

Wrong idea about kinesiology

John Wocher's Aug. 8 letter, "Another quack therapy let loose," demonstrates Wocher's ignorance. (Wocher includes "kinesiology" in a list of alternative-medicine therapies that he suggests lack a scientific foundation.)
JAPAN
Jul 14, 2007

U.S. sex slave resolution about human rights, not Japan-bashing: Honda

and Rep. Jim Costa talk as they wait for a markup session on the sex slave resolution to start in the House Foreign Affairs Committee on June 26 on Capitol Hill. AP PHOTO
JAPAN
Jul 11, 2007

Japan upset by U.S. Navy disclosure about joint drill

The Defense Ministry was in a stir Tuesday over the U.S. Navy's public release of specific details on a joint missile defense exercise last week that the ministry didn't know or that it wanted to be kept secret, including the amount of time it took to inform the prime minister that an enemy state had...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 9, 2007

Act of missionary hypocrisy

The ordeal of the women who were coerced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Armed Forces during the 1930s and 1940s is beyond dispute, as is the responsibility of the Japanese state for these deeds.
JAPAN / Q&A
Jun 30, 2007

Why the big fuss about SIA? Some answers

Two bills to replace the Social Insurance Agency with a government corporation were set to be enacted in the early hours of Saturday morning, despite the opposition camp's last-ditch attempts to stop the vote in the House of Councilors.
BUSINESS
Jun 27, 2007

Nippon Steel unsure about expanding ties with Arcelor Mittal

Nippon Steel Corp., the world's second-largest steelmaker, said Tuesday no "concrete" decision had been made about expanding cooperation with bigger rival Arcelor Mittal.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jun 24, 2007

Somewhere between history and the imagination

David Mitchell is one of Britain's most influential novelists. "Ghostwritten" (1999), his first novel, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and won the Mail on Sunday/John Llewellyn Rhys Prize. Shortlisted for the 2002 Man Booker Prize for fiction, his second novel, "number9dream" (2001),...
JAPAN
Jun 22, 2007

Chongryun's No. 2 man quizzed about HQ deal

, was questioned about the property deal the group made with Shigetake Ogata, 73, who formerly headed the Public Security Intelligence Agency, the sources said. The agency's mission is to surveil groups engaged in subversive activities. Monitoring Chongryun is one of its priorities.
Reader Mail
Jun 13, 2007

What about cigarette smoke?

Regarding the May 31 article "Government proposes programs for asthma prevention in Tokyo wards": It is interesting that Japan's government is focused on automobile pollution in its asthma prevention programs while apparently ignoring cigarette smoking as a major known cause of breathing problems, including...
BASKETBALL
Jun 7, 2007

Orimo welcomes move to new team in Sapporo

He'd been a total stranger to the place for his entire life. But now Takehiko Orimo gets a huge welcome there as a messiah — and he intends to be one.
JAPAN
May 26, 2007

Diet lowers incarceration age to 'about 12'

The Diet enacted a package of new juvenile crime laws on Friday that lowers the minimum age at which a child can be sent to a reformatory to "about 12."
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
May 26, 2007

Bringing about world change through literacy

Imagine. You are a rising executive with Microsoft, with a corporate credit card and an associated lifestyle. Then one day, at age 35, you clear your desk, cash in your investments and walk away.
JAPAN
May 24, 2007

Matsuoka tells Diet he won't talk about office expenses

in attendance. KYODO PHOTO
EDITORIALS
May 20, 2007

Don't be shy about study abroad

A recent report has found that fewer Japanese students than ever are studying abroad. After a peak in the early 1990s, the numbers have declined to the lowest level in years. Remaining in Japan without experiencing life abroad will have repercussions that may last far into the future. More students should...
BASEBALL / MLB
May 10, 2007

Nothing black and white about Bonds debate

The kid who caught home run No. 714 off the bat of Barry Bonds a year ago scurried out of Oakland's stadium with his valuable souvenir without bothering to see what Bonds might want to offer for it.
JAPAN
May 5, 2007

Briton bicycles to remind nation about Article 9's ideology of peace

has become just (the) name of a pachinko parlor for many," Ward said, referring to a major pachinko company, claiming the heart of Article 9 has been lost since most of Japanese have no experience of war. Peace is taken for granted in this country, he said. Ward rearranged his road map from Hiroshima...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Apr 14, 2007

Aiming to cook up a storm in the Big Apple

NEW YORK -- Saori Kawano was working five and a half days a week as a waitress at a Japanese restaurant in Manhattan when she realized something had to change.

Longform

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.
What comes after 100?