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COMMENTARY / World
Mar 9, 2012

Mental health must match post-3/11 recovery

Over the past year, the tsunami-ravaged coastline of Japan's northeast has undergone a cleanup never seen before in history for its sheer scale and speed.
COMMENTARY
Mar 6, 2012

Hamas' perilous maneuvers

Despite all of Hamas' assurances to the contrary, a defining struggle is taking place within the Palestinian Islamic movement. The outcome of this struggle — which is still confined to polite political disagreements and occasional intellectual tussle — is likely to change Hamas' outlook, if not fundamentally...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 6, 2012

Berlitz court ruling unequivocal on basic right to strike

After hearing more than three years of testimony, the judge took only a minute to read the court's verdict rejecting Berlitz Japan's ¥110 million lawsuit against striking teachers and their union and reaffirming organized labor's right to take industrial action.
Reader Mail
Mar 4, 2012

Don't impose gold medal targets

Regarding the Feb. 29 Kyodo article "Draft program targets buckets of Olympic gold medals": If I am not mistaken, the only countries that had or have such government-set numerical targets for Olympic gold medals are dictatorships.
Reader Mail
Mar 4, 2012

Farmer shines a light on Japan

Regarding the Feb. 29 Kyodo article "Fukushima farmer presses Tepco to look after abandoned animals": This person (Naoto Matsumura, 52) is amazing. We lived many years in Japan but have been back in Europe since August.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Mar 3, 2012

Ice phenomenon warms up hearts in the Lake Suwa region

To the delight of local residents this winter, an elevated line of cracked ice appeared on the frozen surface of Lake Suwa in Nagano Prefecture for the first time in four years.
COMMENTARY
Mar 2, 2012

Sure winner fails to inspire

Before the scandalous presidential election of 1996, the situation was clear-cut and critical. A victory by Gennady Zyuganov over Boris Yeltsin would have meant an old-style Communists' revenge for their defeat in the August 1991 putsch as well as a strong drive toward renationalization of the economy...
Reader Mail
Mar 1, 2012

Scale of deception beyond belief

My personal mantra is "expect the worst," but not even that bleak perspective could have prepared me for the dark facts revealed in the Feb. 27 article "Tsunami alert softened days before 3/11." The scale of virtual deception portrayed in the story is beyond anything I ever would have expected.
Reader Mail
Mar 1, 2012

Illegitimate case for striking?

Regarding the Feb. 28 article "Berlitz loses suit over union teacher strikes": Whilst I celebrate the existence of unions if their values are healthy, I fail to see this as a legitimate case for striking.
COMMENTARY
Mar 1, 2012

Labor showdown in Canberra

It was a battle of the opposites. On one side we had ex-Australian prime minister, Kevin Rudd, 54, a former diplomat with baby-face looks, devoted wife and family, carefully cultivated religious persona and impeccable CV. Opposed was current Prime Minister Julia Gillard, 51, ex-lawyer, atheist with a...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LABOR PAINS
Feb 28, 2012

Oversleeping radio anchor set tough precedent for firing staff

A radio news anchor oversleeps a live broadcast twice, forcing the radio station to cancel the broadcast. Should he be fired?
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Feb 28, 2012

Threatened Goldman Japan workers unionize

The past year has been anything but business as usual for the financial industry. Faced with a frosty economic climate, financial service companies have been busy chopping dead wood. Last year, 200,000 financial service jobs ended up on the cutting block worldwide.
Reader Mail
Feb 26, 2012

Historical realities of getting old

In Craig Bowron's Washington Post article "At the end of a loved one's life, why is it so hard to let go?" (reprinted in The Japan Times on Feb. 22), certain impressions about life expectancy need to be further interpreted with examples from advanced societies other than the United States.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Feb 26, 2012

Job-seeking comedy avoids real issues

In 2004, novelist Ryu Murakami published "13-sai no Hello Work," a job guide for 13-year-olds, though most of the copies were bought by adults. The book did not offer practical advice, but rather job descriptions in all lines of work, from engineer to prostitute, in order to give readers an idea of what...
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Feb 25, 2012

Centrair gearing up for a busy summer of travel

Starting in late March, the number of international flights at Central Japan International Airport, also known as Centrair, will return to what they were before the Lehman Brothers collapse in September 2008, reaching 294 per week when airlines switch to their summer timetables.
Reader Mail
Feb 23, 2012

Don't make light of 'center exam'

In the Feb. 3 opinion article "Exam forces students to cram irrelevant facts," was the writer, professor Julian Dierkes of Canada, looking at the same national university exam that I took?
Reader Mail
Feb 23, 2012

Prospect for Japan-China ties

Regarding the Feb. 19 Kyodo article "China calls for closer financial ties": This is a good initiative. It warms my heart every time I hear of the prospect of better relations and trade between China and Japan. If Japan had an independent foreign policy free of U.S. influence, I'm sure our relations...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Feb 21, 2012

Ill-prepared schools put returner, family in tough spot

In response to our recent two-part series on education ("Rejoining school system in Japan after time away can be tough" and "Acceptance — social and otherwise — a crucial issue for Japan returnee kids," Jan. 10 and 17), Rosie decided to share the story of her daughter's difficulties entering the...
Reader Mail
Feb 19, 2012

Time to send U.S. forces packing

Regarding the Feb. 14 front-page Kyodo article "Okinawa marines not Iwakuni-bound": Get the U.S. forces out of Japan. World War II ended almost 70 years ago. Japan does not need U.S. forces based there. All the United States is doing is bullying Japan and other countries, using economic sanctions and...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Feb 19, 2012

Media ratchets up fear of another major earthquake

So called megathrust earthquakes such as the one that struck off the coast of Miyagi Prefecture on March 11, 2011, tend to occur in pairs, with a relatively short gap between them.
Reader Mail
Feb 19, 2012

Explaining things to Okinawans

I write in response to a Japanese newspaper's editorial view that the outcome of last Sunday's Ginowan mayoral election in Okinawa Prefecture should serve as a springboard to ensure that U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma is relocated to the Henoko district of Nago in the same prefecture.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Feb 18, 2012

Nagoya aid for tsunami-hit city starts to pay off

A shiitake grower farmer in disaster-hit Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, is working to cultivate a sales channel in the Chubu region, while a Nagoya-based civil engineering company launches an office near the Tohoku city.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Feb 17, 2012

So how much do politicians' secretaries make?

Lawmakers' publicly paid secretaries can make a lot of money.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 17, 2012

America's pivot to Asia is not just about countering China

"All right China, come out with your hands up; we've got you surrounded!"
JAPAN
Feb 17, 2012

Hashimoto forges ahead with fiery reform agenda

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's campaign to fundamentally reform the central government is moving forward even as Diet lawmakers and members of his own group criticize his goals as unrealistic.
Reader Mail
Feb 16, 2012

Consider the defense alternative

Regarding the Feb. 10 Kyodo article "Iwakuni housing land sale in doubt": Does the Japanese government have no honor? Is its word no good? First we had the interminable squabbles over moving the bulk of the 3rd Marine Division from Okinawa to Guam, and relocating U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma...
COMMENTARY / World / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Feb 14, 2012

Put children before politics

Almost a year after the crisis at Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant following the March 11, earthquake and tsunami, one serious question remains: to what extent have residents in the vicinity of the plant been exposed to radiation?
JAPAN
Feb 14, 2012

Hashimoto group hopes to upset political applecart big time

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's local political group is preparing a platform for the next Lower House poll that will likely include promises to shrink or even abolish the Upper House, create a system for voters to directly elect the prime minister, and to drastically limit the state's role to diplomacy,...
Reader Mail
Feb 12, 2012

Nursing-care tests raise dilemma

The Jan. 31 article "Foreigners' poor test grades force rethink on nurse tests" does raise a dilemma: Should Japan, or should it not, make the nurse certification test easier for foreigners? It may come down to answering the following questions:

Longform

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