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COMMENTARY / World
Nov 11, 2000

The special mandate of peace research

This is the eleventh month of the year, on the eleventh day of which, at the eleventh hour, the world pays homage to those who died in the first great war in the century of wars.
JAPAN
Nov 10, 2000

White House change won't alter policies

Regardless of the outcome of the U.S. presidential race, Japan will continue talks with the new administration regarding Okinawa Prefecture's demand for a 15-year limit on the U.S. military's use of a planned new airfield there, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda said Thursday.
COMMENTARY
Nov 10, 2000

Mori's nine lives are almost used up

The coalition government of Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori is clearly in a delicate situation. Should he make another serious mistake, Mori will be forced to resign. I had some hopes for Mori as prime minister, since the late Foreign Minister Shintaro Abe, a friend of mine, had praised his political acumen....
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 8, 2000

A chance to reshape U.S.-Japan ties

Foreign policy is never a cutting-edge issue in U.S. presidential elections, and this year's campaign is no exception. Even when the candidates have ventured into the territory, the focus has been on China, North Korea or the role of U.S. forces in Europe or Africa or even Haiti. When Japan makes the...
JAPAN
Nov 5, 2000

New Komeito convention trumpets independent agenda

New Komeito, a junior ruling-coalition member, pledged at the party's annual convention in Tokyo on Saturday to more aggressively pursue reforms rather than sacrificing its agenda to maintain the coalition.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 4, 2000

Two Koreas grapple with a long history

U.S. Secretary of State Madeline Albright's recent remark that "my glasses aren't rose-colored" when it comes to North Korea has touched a deep chord in South Korea. The pace and productiveness of North-South exchanges has noticeably slowed since the summer, and off-again, on-again North-South meetings...
JAPAN
Nov 2, 2000

Fighting system is folly: Tanaka

OSAKA -- Nagano Gov. Yasuo Tanaka said he has learned from the mistakes of other populist governors who took on the bureaucracy and lost, emphasizing that the age of traditional confrontational politics between small citizens' groups and bureaucrats is over.
JAPAN
Nov 1, 2000

Khatami meets Kono in Tokyo

Iranian President Mohammad Khatami expressed his desire to expand bilateral ties with Japan in the areas of economics, politics and culture on Tuesday, the first day of his four-day visit.
JAPAN
Oct 30, 2000

Opposition camp wants summons for Nakagawa

Opposition parties said Sunday they will demand former Chief Cabinet Secretary Hidenao Nakagawa be summoned to the Diet to respond to allegations that he leaked police information to his former mistress and is closely tied with a rightwing extremist.
JAPAN
Oct 28, 2000

With shield gone, Mori may be next

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori's decision Friday to accept Chief Cabinet Secretary Hidenao Nakagawa's resignation was apparently aimed at containing further damage to his administration, which was battered recently over his comments regarding a controversial proposal to North Korea.
JAPAN
Oct 27, 2000

Nagano governor tells staff their job is to serve

New Nagano Gov. Yasuo Tanaka, making his debut Thursday at the prefectural office, said he will pursue a new administration that can "flexibly and quickly" absorb the opinions of the people.
CULTURE / Music / PLAY BUTTON
Oct 27, 2000

'Soul music' comes naturally to OOIOO

Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth once described her position as a woman between two boys with guitars as like being in the center of a circle jerk. Yoshimi P-We, the Boredoms' minxy drummer, could probably relate. As the rhythm section for the Boredoms' musical onslaught, she is at ground zero between both...
COMMENTARY
Oct 27, 2000

The coalition loads the dice

A few months ago, leaders of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party were concerned that the party could suffer a shocking setback in the Upper House election next year if Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori remained in power then. There were also widespread fears that the ruling coalition of the LDP, New Komeito...
COMMENTARY
Oct 23, 2000

LDP is up to its old tricks

The current 150th Diet session is in unprecedented chaos over an electoral reform bill to revise the Upper House voting system. The bill would change the roster system for candidates nominated in the proportional-representation segment of the Upper House polls. Currently, parties predetermine the ranks...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 19, 2000

Talking head Tanaka wows 'em in Nagano

Yasuo Tanaka, candidate for the governorship of Nagano Prefecture, was supposed to meet voters at 2:30 p.m. at a shopping arcade in downtown Nagano, but it was a long arcade. A campaign worker wearing a bright orange windbreaker was handing out literature in front of Ito Yokado. "I think it's been changed,"...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 18, 2000

Sri Lanka and the Bandaranaike legacy

Almost drowned out by the blare of daily horrors in the Middle East, the world's first elected woman prime minister, Sirima Bandaranaike, died last week in Sri Lanka aged 84. Fittingly, she died on the way home from casting her vote in an election called by her daughter, the country's current president....
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 14, 2000

Cambodian media: cowed and corrupt

PHNOM PENH -- They don't have to worry as much as before about getting shot on the street or having grenades thrown at their houses. But Cambodia's journalists still labor under a government that doesn't like dissent. And the country still has to put up with journalists who create problems for themselves...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 13, 2000

Will Arab fury translate into action?

BEIRUT -- In his workshop in suburban Beirut, Reef Hammoudi has been painting Israeli and American flags at the rate of 50 a day, so high is the demand from people demonstrating in support of the new Palestinian "intifada." He does them on nonabsorbant cloth just an hour or so before they are due for...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 12, 2000

In Labor's moment of crisis, Blair delivers

The recent Labor Party conference in Brighton saw Prime Minister Tony Blair in an unprecedented position. Set against a backdrop of enormous public discontent, evident in the response to the fuel strike by the major oil companies, the Labor Party staged its centenary conference. The phony peace that...
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Oct 11, 2000

U.S. race is too close to call

The 2000 U.S. presidential election campaign closely resembles a roller-coaster ride. The candidates are gyrating up and down in the polls, both in momentum and in spirit.
COMMENTARY
Oct 9, 2000

The crystal balls grow opaque

All kinds of "self-confident" experts make predictions in the mass media about the economy and politics. In Japan, such experts are rarely held accountable if they err in their predictions. In the late 1980s, when the bubble economy peaked, Japanese experts expressed the following opinions that later...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 9, 2000

Taiwan's 'experiment in government' fails

TAIPEI -- The ground heaved and shook in Taiwan's turbulent political landscape last Tuesday, and by the time the dust had cleared after the sudden resignation of Prime Minister Tang Fei, President Chen Shui-bian's 5 month-old model for government -- in his words, "a government for all the people" --...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 9, 2000

Confronting a legacy of shame

WHAT DID THE INTERNMENT OF JAPANESE AMERICANS MEAN?, edited by Alice Yang Murray. Boston, Mass.: Bedford/St. Martins, 2000, 163 pp., $13.50 (paper). This book is part of a series called "Historians At Work." Aimed at the undergraduate student, the series is designed to introduce students to a historical...
EDITORIALS
Oct 8, 2000

Yugoslavia's new beginning

The end of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic came, comparatively speaking, with the proverbial whimper. There were massive protests, general strikes and sporadic outbreaks of violence. But there was no cataclysm, no gruesome show trial and execution as was the fate of former Romanian tyrant Nicolae...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Oct 8, 2000

Toru Hirota

For the cover of its catalog for this year's 45th annual print show, the College Women's Association of Japan chose a print with a musical theme. "Polonaise Fantasy" depicts miniature cyclists and runners racing over a fanciful keyboard against a back cloth of an even more fanciful musical score. "I...
EDITORIALS
Oct 7, 2000

The U.S. gets a real choice

There are complaints aplenty about U.S. politics, but the first debate between this year's presidential candidates was a reminder of what is right with the system. Rarely do voters anywhere have the opportunity to see their candidates square off and discuss issues in an intelligent and direct manner....
CULTURE / Music / HOGAKU TODAY
Oct 7, 2000

Tales of romance and bloodshed come alive in Shinnai song

Some of the performing arts of Japan are so spectacular that they grab your attention and immediately make you feel a part of the music. Taiko drumming is one; rhythm speaks directly to our bodies, and the beating of a stick on a drum has a physical appeal to all, regardless of language or culture.

Longform

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