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CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 19, 2004

Wheeler-dealers can always go home if the going gets dicey

UGLY AMERICANS: The True Story of the Ivy League Cowboys Who Raided the Asian Markets for Millions, by Ben Mezrich. William Morrow, 2004, $24.95 (cloth). The financial tycoons depicted in "Ugly Americans" were once dubbed Masters of the Universe, but they emerge here as hedonistic clowns. Their story...
EDITORIALS
Dec 18, 2004

Putting off unpalatable choices

It is axiomatic to say that the taxes people pay represent the most basic cost of maintaining autonomy and democracy. That's why the tax code should be written by national legislators, not government bureaucrats. But tax reform is almost always controversial, as evidenced by the fiscal 2005 tax reform...
JAPAN
Dec 18, 2004

Iraqi officials end seminar with plan to save their marshlands

OSAKA -- A two-week seminar for Iraqi officials on preserving the rapidly disappearing marshlands in southern Iraq concluded Friday with plans to launch a pilot program that would introduce water and sanitation technologies to the area.
Dec 18, 2004

Iraqi officials end seminar with plan to save their marshlands

OSAKA -- A two-week seminar for Iraqi officials on preserving the rapidly disappearing marshlands in southern Iraq concluded Friday with plans to launch a pilot program that would introduce water and sanitation technologies to the area.
EDITORIALS
Dec 16, 2004

WTO says bye-bye Byrdie

U .S. trade practices were slapped again recently when the World Trade Organization imposed penalties on a wide range of U.S. exports. The decision targets the Byrd Amendment, a law that was passed to protect U.S. steel makers harmed by cheaper imports of foreign steel. The WTO had already determined...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 15, 2004

Muraoka denies role in donation coverup

Former Chief Cabinet Secretary Kanezo Muraoka on Tuesday denied helping to cover up a 100 million yen donation made to the Liberal Democratic Party's largest faction by the Japan Dental Association in 2001.
Dec 15, 2004

Muraoka denies role in donation coverup

Former Chief Cabinet Secretary Kanezo Muraoka on Tuesday denied helping to cover up a 100 million yen donation made to the Liberal Democratic Party's largest faction by the Japan Dental Association in 2001.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 12, 2004

Give Japan's royal diplomacy a chance

Something is amiss within Japan's Imperial household. For nearly a year now, the Crown Princess Masako has suspended her official functions for "health reasons." The public knew next to nothing about the details of her disposition or the effectiveness of treatment, for reasons that included the extreme...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Dec 11, 2004

Bill Hemmer

CNN claims that "American Morning," its flagship news program, is seen in more than 86 million households in the U.S. Here in Japan through CNNj, a partnership between CNN and Japan Cable Television, it may be seen in over 5 million households. This year marks the 20th anniversary of CNN's first live...
COMMENTARY
Dec 11, 2004

More to winning than tackling the Taliban

ISLAMABAD -- A call by a senior U.S. official urging Afghanistan's Taliban fighters to lay down their arms in exchange for a promise that only those guilty of major crimes would be punished marks a departure from Washington's traditional hardline stance toward the group.
COMMENTARY
Dec 9, 2004

U.N. will reform or slide into oblivion

LOS ANGELES -- If the United Nations were somehow to disappear from the face of the Earth, would people care -- or even notice?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 8, 2004

Art stripped bare by mass produced ideas

The National Museum of Art, Osaka, relocated this year from Expo Park to elegant new premises in the commercial Nakanoshima district. The architect Cesar Pelli -- who is also responsible for the recent redesign of Haneda Airport in Tokyo -- resisted contesting the air space of the surrounding and soaring...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 5, 2004

Way of the corporate giant robot

MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM, by Yoshiyuki Tomino, translated by Frederik L. Schodt with an introduction by Mark Simmons. Stone Bridge Press, 2004, $14.95 (paper). Yoshiyuki "Kill 'em All" Tomino is the mega-prolific creator of the Mobile Suit Gundam phenomenon, known, perhaps a little patronizingly, as the "Star...
EDITORIALS
Dec 4, 2004

Asia takes a historic step

Historians may well look back at this week's summit of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations and call it the first real move toward creating a regional economic group that unites all of Asia. It pushed the political agenda forward as well, signaling a shift in the ASEAN-Plus-Three (Japan,...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 4, 2004

LDP faction treasurer handed suspended term

The Tokyo District Court accepted a former Liberal Democratic Party faction treasurer's admission that he conspired with a superior to falsify the group's 2001 political funds report, and sentenced him Friday to a suspended 10-month prison term.
COMMENTARY
Dec 2, 2004

Risks to secular government

MANILA -- In the Cold War era, the global confrontation was basically ideological. Two radically different socio-political blueprints were pitted against each other: democracy and capitalism on one side, one-party-rule and communism on the other. The opponents, then, were two superpowers and their allies...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 1, 2004

Liberate your mind and art

The conductor walks away. The crowd applauds. Beethoven's 5th? A moving rendition by the orchestra? Eric Satie? Closer, but wrong again. The performer is Ben Patterson and he's just completed George Maciunas' "Solo for Conductor." For this, he bent over to face the audience, placed his baton on the floor...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Dec 1, 2004

John and Joe: singin' bout their generations

In his famous 1976 essay, "The Me Decade and the Third Great Awakening," Tom Wolfe first put forth the now widely accepted idea that the counterculture of the 1960s had been perverted in the '70s by formerly progressive-minded baby boomers when they realized that genuine social change wasn't as important...
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 29, 2004

A new dawn for Myanmar?

Many Myanmar watchers might have been surprised when they got news of the pending release of nearly 4,000 prisoners who had been inappropriately jailed by the notorious Military Intelligence (MI) wing of former Prime Minister Gen. Khin Nyunt's regime.
COMMENTARY
Nov 22, 2004

Liberals should stand proud

LONDON -- U.S. President George W. Bush's favorite accusation in the election campaign is reported to have been that Sen. John Kerry was a "liberal." The president seems to have used the label as a term of abuse meaning a "leftwing" radical and a supporter of the appeasement of terrorists.
JAPAN
Nov 19, 2004

Kato makes LDP faction comeback

Veteran Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker Koichi Kato, who was once widely seen as a future prime minister, returned Thursday to an LDP faction to which he had previously belonged.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Nov 18, 2004

Bush-Kerry presidential contest was one for the textbooks

WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush's re-election victory was a masterpiece of political strategy and execution by the Bush campaign team. There has been a feeling of relief throughout the nation that:
COMMENTARY
Nov 17, 2004

Bush's win doesn't mean Musharraf can rest easy

ISLAMABAD -- The re-election of U.S. President George W. Bush for another four years comes as a welcome development for the pro-American government of Pakistan's military ruler, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. Relations between the two countries have been close since Pakistan became an ally in the U.S.-led war...
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Nov 17, 2004

Mound relief almost backfired for MLB pitchers

The visiting Major League Baseball All-Stars left Japan Nov. 14 with a 5-3 series victory over their All-Japan opponents but, ironically, a change in the pitching mounds designed to help the big leaguers for the final three games of the tour almost resulted in disaster for the visitors. Let me explain....
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Nov 14, 2004

TV Asahi's special five-part drama series and more

To celebrate its 45th anniversary, TV Asahi will present a special five-part drama series about Japan's favorite siblings -- Yujiro and Shintaro Ishihara. Like Elvis, Yujiro's early death has only increased the actor-singer's popularity, and since his older brother, who was responsible for making him...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 11, 2004

More study of climate change needed: scientist

Studying the ozone layer is essential to curbing global warming, says a U.S scientist who has just been awarded the 2004 Blue Planet Prize.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 9, 2004

Neocon lessons for Democrats

WASHINGTON -- As Democrats comb the 2004 election results for lessons, one should be obvious: we need bolder, newer ideas, particularly in this post-9/11 world in the realm of foreign policy. Just as neocons have provided much of the spark and intellectual energy behind modern-day Republicanism, Democrats...

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