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Japan Times
MULTIMEDIA
Aug 26, 2014

[SLIDESHOW] Street dancing at Super Yosakoi 2014

This year, the Super Yosakoi event attracted 98 dance teams from all across Japan. Over the weekend of Aug .23-24, approximately 6,000 team members of all ages strutted their stuff on stages and boulevards in Tokyo's Harajuku and Omotesando area. Here are highlights from the festival's climax: a continuous four-hour parade of dance, song and smiles.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 26, 2014

Brace for the coming CLASS war

The balkanization of global banking by the U.S.' requiring all foreign banks in the country to become subsidiary companies and international banks with U.S.-dollar clearing accounts to comply to some degree with U.S. foreign policy by refraining from trading with U.S. enemies defines a key threat facing the world today.
EDITORIALS
Aug 25, 2014

Difficult time for pensioners

Pensioners' lives are likely to become even more severe in fiscal 2015 as scheduled increases in pension payments track lower than the rise in general prices.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 25, 2014

'Abenomics' needs reform

Abenomics' has made a good start, thanks to the expansionary monetary policy and fiscal expenditures. But it relies too much on monetary policy.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 25, 2014

The unsung heroes of Fukushima

What really went on among the workers inside the Fukushima No. 2 nuclear power plant after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami should be held up as an epic story with the theme of 'Man Saved in Japan.'
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 25, 2014

Next time, China might have to face the fire

China's leaders should take advantage of the recent respite from instability and low confidence to redouble their economic reform efforts. Otherwise, they can expect alarm bells to begin ringing again.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 25, 2014

Pity Moscow's foodies as Putin's sanctions bite

A food writer in Moscow finds President Vladimir Putin's annoying at the best of times, but this month her distaste has blossomed into unbridled loathing after Russia imposed sanctions on food imports from the U.S., EU, Canada and Japan.
WORLD
Aug 25, 2014

Burger King in buyout talks with Canada chain Tim Hortons

Burger King Worldwide Inc. is negotiating to buy Canadian coffee and doughnut chain Tim Hortons Inc. and relocate its base to the U.S. neighbor, where corporate tax rates are lower.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 25, 2014

European winemakers fret over competition from Chile

Imports of Chilean wines to Japan recently outperformed those of Italian wines
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 24, 2014

Japan's universities can't win

In view of the disparity in professors' pay between Japanese and American universities, the notion of elevating Japanese universities' global rankings simply by bringing in outstanding 'foreign talent' as instructors and researchers is a castle in the sky.
BASKETBALL
Aug 22, 2014

Evessa sign forwards Hamilton, Tarver

Veteran forward Gary Hamilton, an accomplished rebounder and frontcourt leader for the Shiga Lakestars and Rizing Fukuoka in past bj-league seasons, is returning to Japan.
Japan Times
CULTURE / CULTURE SMASH
Aug 22, 2014

Haruki Murakami's Cool Japan

I was in New York last week to host a launch event for the English translation of Haruki Murakami's latest novel, "Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage." My good friend and Murakami translator Ted Goossen, professor at York University in Toronto, joined me, as did pianist Eunbi Kim, whose...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 22, 2014

Tokyo governor takes on big tobacco to push smoke-free games

Half a century after making $1 million off an official Olympics-branded cigarette, Tokyo's chief wants to put stricter curbs on smoking before the 2020 Summer Games.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 22, 2014

U.S.-Israeli affair almost over

Today the endorsement of Israel and financial support from the American Jewish community remain important but diminishing factors in American politics. Sympathies, especially among younger Jews, have moved leftward.
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Aug 21, 2014

Grouses remain in transition as preseason looms

Less than two weeks before the league's preseason schedule tips off, the Toyama Grouses roster doesn't resemble the one that soared to great heights last season.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 21, 2014

Bereft of sense, government does what it can

Washington's response to the menace of school bake sales illustrates progressivism's ratchet: The federal government subsidizes school lunches, so it must control the lunches' contents, which validates regulation of what it calls 'competitive foods,' such as vending machine snacks.
BUSINESS / Markets
Aug 21, 2014

Deutsche Bank lays seeds for future with warrants in Japan

Deutsche Bank AG is helping smaller Japanese companies less able to access the bond market raise money using warrants, as it searches for investment banking clients to generate future business.
Japan Times
OLYMPICS / SPORTS SCOPE
Aug 19, 2014

Critics of Tokyo 2020 venues misguided

The Tokyo 2020 Olympics are still almost six years away, but in many ways the games have already begun.
EDITORIALS
Aug 19, 2014

Higher standards for assemblies

Recent instances of strange or illegal behavior on the part of municipal and prefectural assembly members, including a bawling jag by a Hyogo assemblymen whose hand was caught in the cookie jar, have given many citizens cause to suspect that the overall quality of their local lawmakers is deteriorating.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 19, 2014

Asia's budding reform trinity

Three of Asia's most populous countries — China, India and Indonesia — are poised to enter a historical sweet spot, as their respective leaders build a reputation as one of his country's greatest modern reformists.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 19, 2014

U.S. riots raise issue of racial profiling

The Ferguson, Missouri, race riots over the shooting of an unarmed young black man by a white cop underscore the beginning of a national conversation in the U.S. about police racial profiling of African Americans.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Aug 19, 2014

As Taliban push for territory quickens, Afghan troops get new kill orders

As U.S. forces withdraw from Afghanistan, the battlefield they leave behind is changing dramatically and becoming more deadly.
MULTIMEDIA
Aug 19, 2014

[VIDEO] Tokyo Gundam Project 2014: G-Party35 “RISE!”

COMMENTARY / World
Aug 18, 2014

Make no mistake about Thailand's problem

The Thai military has not played the role of 'democratic defender' following its recent coup. Instead, its intervention shows its desperate move to maintain power ahead of the imminent royal succession.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Markets
Aug 18, 2014

New 'Bernanke shock' in cards for emerging markets: ex-IMF exec Kato

Emerging markets are at risk of revisiting last year's "Bernanke shock" should the Federal Reserve signal an end to near-zero interest rates earlier than investors anticipate, according to Takatoshi Kato, once a deputy managing director at the International Monetary Fund.
Japan Times
WORLD / ANALYSIS
Aug 18, 2014

Europe struggles with cost of caring for its elderly nuclear plants

Europe's aging nuclear plants will undergo more prolonged outages over the next few years, reducing the reliability of power supply and costing operators many billions of dollars.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Aug 17, 2014

From 2015, you may not have to work 25 years to draw a pension

The period you have to pay into the system to be eligible to draw a pension is supposed to be cut down to 10 years in October 2015, but this is inextricably linked to a planned consumption tax hike.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 17, 2014

Rising hope for nations with falling birthrates

The lamentations of some economists in the advanced economies would have us believe that a shrinking population is a bad thing. In fact, the benefits of demographic stability, or even a slight decline, outweigh any adverse effects.
JAPAN / FUKUSHIMA FILE
Aug 17, 2014

First tranche of public housing for Fukushima evacuees hit by delays

About 40 percent of the first batch of public housing for people displaced by the Fukushima nuclear disaster will not be ready by the end of fiscal 2015, forcing those who evacuated to wait longer for permanent abodes.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami