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Reader Mail
Jul 26, 2012

'Gun nut' got what he wanted

The Japan Times' decision to run the picture of the U.S. gunman with the July 22 front-page story about the movie theater attack was regrettable. It rewarded him for murder, giving the gun nut exactly what he wanted.
COMMENTARY
Jul 24, 2012

Place names defy tradition, distressing the Russian spirit

In the early 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, a countrywide campaign of toponymic change brought back many historic names — first of all in Moscow and in Leningrad (which in due course was returned to its proper name St. Petersburg). Soon after, however, these spontaneous activities abruptly...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Jul 22, 2012

Yokohama's Miura values long tenure with BayStars

Daisuke Miura didn't really take to being called "Hama no Bancho" initially.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jul 22, 2012

Power spots and prehistory in beautiful Aomori Prefecture

The government of Aomori Prefecture which straddles the whole of the northern end of Japan's main island of Honshu — and is best known as the nation's apple capital — broke new ground in its tourism promotion campaign late last year, when it announced it would start selling the prefecture as the...
Reader Mail
Jul 22, 2012

Avoid tabloid-style headlines

Regarding the July 15 Kyodo article "Police to grill 300 pupils, parents over boy's suicide": Police to "grill" pupils? Seriously? Are they going to deny them cigarettes and really give them the third degree? Inappropriately dramatic headlines like this always make me visualize gray-haired editors fondly...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / THE ZEIT GIST
Jul 17, 2012

Refugee groups slam Japan's struggling resettlement plan

Much fanfare greeted the arrival at Narita in September 2010 of the first Burmese refugees to take advantage of Japan's decision to join the U.N.'s third-country resettlement program. Japan was the first Asian country to join the program, it was emphasized, under which the country would take in "less...
Reader Mail
Jul 15, 2012

Leveling field should be in court

Regarding Sarah Fuidio's July 5 letter, "Leveling the field for women": July 4 was the 236th birthday of the United States, which relentlessly upholds its original constitution and the amendments. I take this occasion to express my great admiration for the U.S. Supreme Court for defending the constitution's...
EDITORIALS
Jul 15, 2012

Downward trend in drinking

When Japanese men cut spending on drinking, something is wrong. A recent survey of male workers aged 20 to 59 by Shinsei Financial Co. found that spending on alcohol has fallen to its lowest level since the survey started in 1999.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 13, 2012

High price of the most gorgeous show in town

Note to self: Never be a young woman in Japan. It's just too harrowing.
COMMENTARY
Jul 12, 2012

Why America's economic policy is paralyzed

Wondering why government can't restart the sluggish economy? Well, one reason is that we are still paying the price for the greatest blunder in domestic policy since World War II. This occurred a half-century ago and helps explain today's policy paralysis. The story — largely unrecognized — is worth...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media
Jul 8, 2012

Keeping an eye on TV news coverage of the nuke crisis

In the week immediately after March 11, 2011 — when a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami hit Tohoku and crippled the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant — most Japanese were closely watching TV news programs — amazed that a nuclear crisis was now threatening their lives.
Reader Mail
Jul 1, 2012

Past nuclear lessons not heeded

Regarding The Washington Post article appearing on the front page of The Japan Times on June 27 titled "Nuclear redress will never approximate losses": Media such as The Washington Post and even The New York Times are finally acknowledging that nuclear energy itself was not the cause of the angst and...
BUSINESS
Jun 30, 2012

Spending on drinking hits 14-year low

Japanese men cut spending on drinking to the lowest level in at least 14 years as household allowances remained at about half of what they were during the heyday of the bubble economy.
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Jun 29, 2012

Warriors to give Burrell shot in Summer League

Power forward Justin Burrell has accepted an invitation to play for the Golden State Warriors in the NBA Summer League in July.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Jun 22, 2012

Grouses need coach after Shimoji steps down

After nearly finishing with their first winning season in franchise history, the Toyama Grouses will not have Kazuaki Shimoji at the helm in 2012-13. Serious health issues appear to be the primary factor, league insiders told The Japan Times.
CULTURE / Books
Jun 17, 2012

Long journey home for a soldier-journalist

MARCH FORTH, by Trevor and Debbie Greene. Harper and Collins, 2012, 272 pp., $29.00 (hardcover) On March 4, 2006, a Canadian patrol led by Capt. Kevin Schamuhn was on security operations in the Gumbad Valley, in the Shah Wali Koi District, an area known to be a hotbed of Taliban activity. The patrol...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Jun 12, 2012

Big Bulls hire Oketani; Tokyo, Ryukyu fill spots

That was quick.
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Jun 8, 2012

Oketani era finished in Okinawa: sources

A major shift in the bj-league's coaching ranks appears imminent.
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Jun 5, 2012

'It's just because ... foreigners know best': readers' views

Some readers' views on John Spiri's May 1 Zeit Gist column, "It's just because . . . foreigners know best":
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Jun 4, 2012

A hot genpatsu-free summer threatens

Two things make a battered Japan cringe: genpatsu (原発, nuclear power) and fukeiki (不景気, economic stagnation). The nation has suffered deeply from both. As spring fades into a potentially sweltering, potentially stagnant summer, there arises an agonizing dilemma: Can the latter be avoided, or...
JAPAN / History / JAPAN TIMES GONE BY
May 20, 2012

Back from Antarctica, Hindenburg disaster, Joban Line trains derail, Issey Miyake men's collection in Japan

100 YEARS AGO
Japan Times
JAPAN
May 17, 2012

Agent Orange 'tested in Okinawa'

Recently uncovered documents show that the United States conducted top-secret tests of Agent Orange in Okinawa in 1962, according to a veterans services employee.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / JAPAN TIMES BLOGROLL
May 16, 2012

Tokyo Green Space

What do you see when you look at Tokyo? Hypermodern constructions of steel and concrete? Cubic, characterless office buildings? Jared Braiterman sees green ... in the back streets, in the small cracks of dirt on the sidewalks and on his balcony. He finds patches, slivers and swaths of nature that tourists...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 10, 2012

Makoto Morimura literally finds hope in the news

Osaka-based artist Makoto Morimura was surely not alone last year in feeling that the newspapers were full of gloom and doom. But he probably was the only person who in response set for himself the task of searching for hope, literally.
JAPAN
May 9, 2012

Cellphone users default on payments

Cellphone users are increasingly failing to meet installment contract obligations for the devices and are thus damaging their credit ratings, a Tokyo-based credit information firm told The Japan Times Tuesday.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices
May 8, 2012

The top 10 Zeit Gist articles of the past decade, chosen by the readers

1. Battling a broken system, by RICHARD CORY One day in March, just minutes after my daughter and I returned home from celebrating her graduation from elementary school that morning, her mother, from whom I had filed for divorce in January after 17 years of marriage, lured my daughter out of the house,...
Japan Times
JAPAN
May 4, 2012

Conservatives call for revising Constitution

The time has come for political parties to overcome their differences and join hands to revise the Constitution to suit the times, including by establishing of an "army" to protect Japan, its people and its territory, conservative lawmakers said Thursday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 3, 2012

Kyte promise new songs, special treat for fans at upcoming gig

The music of indie-pop group Kyte may be created in a bedroom in Leicester, England, but the band says its spacious and electronic sound seems to resonate best with audiences in Japan.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / HOOP SCOOP
Apr 29, 2012

Yokohama's Burrell the total package

Justin Burrell embodies the best attributes of professional sports.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 26, 2012

Rockers CN Blue stand out amid dancey K-pop

Since its 2009 debut in South Korea, CN Blue has been a bastion of rock in a music scene dominated by danceable electro-pop.

Longform

Figure skater Akiko Suzuki was once told her ideal weight should be 47 kilograms, a number she now admits she “naively believed.” This led to her have a relationship with food that resulted in her suffering from anorexia.
The silent battle Japanese athletes fight with weight