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Japan Times
WORLD
Nov 4, 2013

As U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan, poppy trade it spent billions fighting still flourishes

The United States is withdrawing troops from Afghanistan having lost its battle against the country's narcotics industry, marking one of the starkest failures of the 2009 strategy the Obama administration pursued in an effort to turn around the war.
Japan Times
WORLD
Nov 3, 2013

Miranda was held for 'political' acts

The detention of the partner of a former Guardian journalist has triggered fresh concerns after it emerged that a key reason cited by police for holding him under terrorism powers was the belief that he was promoting a "political or ideological cause."
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / JAPAN TIMES GONE BY
Nov 2, 2013

The last of the shoguns; fighting widens; Yokohama train crash kills 129; Emperor's health slips

The proposal of providing a large public park at Inokashira for the benefit of the people of Tokyo has been approved by the Municipal Council. The Emperor has graciously offered the use of an extensive lot in that locality for that purpose.
Japan Times
WORLD
Nov 2, 2013

Obama meets Iraq's al-Maliki, remains mum on arms sales

President Barack Obama assured visiting Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Friday that the United States wants to be a strong partner in bringing about a stable and inclusive Iraq amid a rapid spike in sectarian violence that threatens security across the country.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 30, 2013

Voices of Syria's war set to haunt Tokyo stage

The war in Syria has been making headlines for more than two years now, but it's made very little impact on the theater world in Japan. Next month, though, that's set to change with the Tokyo staging of "The Fear of Breathing," a hard-hitting British documentary drama about that ongoing multi-pronged...
Reader Mail
Oct 30, 2013

Not about being labeled or liked

In his Oct. 17 letter, "Tough armchair conservationist," which is a rebuttal to my Oct. 10 letter, "Activists who act like terrorists," Ivor Paul calls me a conservative for my views. It has happened before, in this column and in people's personal blogs as well.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Oct 29, 2013

SDP woos Koizumi to lend clout to anti-nuclear drive

Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi raises hopes he will stage a comeback as an anti-nuclear crusader.
Japan Times
WORLD / ANALYSIS
Oct 28, 2013

Al-Qaida affiliate shakes Iraq with surge of violence

Nearly two years after the U.S. troop withdrawal, Iraq is in the midst of a deepening security crisis as an al-Qaida affiliate wages a relentless campaign of attacks, sending the death toll soaring to its highest level since 2008.
JAPAN / KANSAI PERSPECTIVE
Oct 27, 2013

Hashimoto's relevancy beginning to fade

When the candidate backed by Osaka Mayor and Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Restoration Party) co-leader Toru Hashimoto was defeated in September by Sakai Mayor Osami Takeyama, a staunch Hashimoto foe, it marked what is widely seen as the beginning of the end of the whole Hashimoto-Nippon Ishin movement,...
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Oct 27, 2013

Rajapaksa: Sri Lanka's affable authoritarian?

Down in the deep south of Sri Lanka, where life usually moves at a leisurely pace, there is one small town that is less tranquil. Hambantota — population 20,000 — is expanding fast. There is a vast new deepwater port, built with $360 million of borrowed Chinese cash; a new 35,000-seat cricket stadium;...
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Oct 27, 2013

Tea party darling Cruz burnishes conservative credentials in Iowa

Sen. Ted Cruz used a series of long-scheduled appearances in Iowa over the weekend to cast himself as the natural leader of a burgeoning conservative movement that nearly derailed the new health care law.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Oct 27, 2013

White House rallies Democrats in effort to shore up health site push

By the time President Barack Obama acknowledged on Monday that his signature health care program had serious problems, it was clear the political stakes had escalated for the White House.
Reader Mail
Oct 23, 2013

Future of liberal arts education

Regarding Geoffry Hinton's Oct. 20 letter, "Liberal arts foster a lifelong quest": The definition of liberal arts is confusing. Hinton appears to have quoted Wikipedia's 13th-century definition in which even medicine, law, and all arts and sciences are liberal arts.
Reader Mail
Oct 23, 2013

Abe's quest for a nuclear base

Surely the headline for the Oct. 19 article "Fukushima 2020: Will Japan be able to keep the nuclear situation under control?" is rhetorical, as the instigator of the nuclear coverup, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, is about to pass his "Whatever-I-Feel-Like-Making-Secret-Is-Secret Act," for which he will...
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Oct 23, 2013

Amid thaw, Iranians debate usefulness of anti-Americanism

Recent moves by the United States to engage the new Iranian government headed by a moderate president has triggered a public debate in the Islamic republic over its national interests, forcing hard-line conservatives to defend Tehran's 34-year-old enmity with Washington.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 22, 2013

Far from declining, America is on the rise again

In the 1970s and late '80s, expectations of America's waning power were followed by periods of geopolitical resurgence. There's every reason to believe that cycle is recurring today.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 21, 2013

Nobel committee overlooks beguiling reality of markets

The Flat Earth Society has all but disappeared, but the Nobel Prize Committee for Economic Sciences would have us believe that the efficient-market hypothesis is alive and well.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 21, 2013

For the GOP to survive, the tea party must die

Tea party supporters think they are fighting for America's Republican soul. If they win, they will drive the party so far from the middle that a GOP president will become unimaginable.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 21, 2013

America's reckless financial policy

The U.S. pattern of decision making (or nondecision making) on debt deadlines has already created additional risk and will surely be reflected in upward pressure on interest rates.
COMMENTARY / Japan / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Oct 20, 2013

Political winds buffet NHK

An NHK insider warns that the quality of Japan's public broadcasting system is threatened by a poor personnel appointment for which Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is pulling the strings.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Oct 20, 2013

School aims to give biracial kids a place to 'be themselves'

Melissa Tomlinson doesn't have very happy memories of elementary school. As an 8-year-old, she "never had a chance to eat lunch normally — the other kids put something in it, or they mixed the milk and soup and orange together and told me to eat it."
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 20, 2013

Banish the notion of a military solution in Syria

Some people now warn of a 'Lebanonization' of Syria — its partition into quasi-independent regions — which could call the entire post-World War I Middle Eastern state system.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Oct 19, 2013

On the beat with a cultural detective

The recent success of Barry Lancet, first time author and resident of Japan for over 25 years, reads like a bar-stool fantasy for any wanna-be writer, and Lancet's definitely enjoying the dream-like reality. With the TV rights optioned by Hollywood, positive reviews surging in across the globe, six countries...
WORLD / Politics
Oct 19, 2013

Top-two primary systems could counter American extremist tendencies

The latest game of political chicken that drove Washington to a government shutdown and the very edge of the debt ceiling gave new life to the omnipresent complaint of elder statesmen and centrist wise guys: If only congressional districts weren't so gerrymandered in the decennial redistricting process,...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 18, 2013

Shōchū and the art of conflict resolution: an islander's insight

If you don't drink shochu, you're bound to have problems adjusting to island life. It's like moving to Okinawa and not partaking in awamori: It's a part of the local culture.
EDITORIALS
Oct 18, 2013

Revitalizing the SDP

Under its newly elected leader, the Social Democratic Party must go beyond shouting 'Protect the pacifist Constitution!' if its mission is to build a more equitable Japanese society.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 18, 2013

Civilizing academia's marketplace of ideas

History professor Niall Ferguson goes after liberal economist Paul Krugman, calling him the intellectual equivalent of a robber baron for the way he 'abuses his power' in the blogosphere.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 17, 2013

Making do without Obama

More attention has been given to U.S. President Barack Obama's decision to cancel his trip to Asia because of Beltway politics than to what the regional ministers did without him.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 17, 2013

'Jinrui Shikin (Human Trust)'

Sometimes as a reviewer of Japanese films I feel I am on the wrong side of the cultural divide, with no way to bridge the gap.

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