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Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 4, 2007

The camera and the truth

With his fake documentary purporting to show serving President George W. Bush's assassination, director Gabriel Range has made this year's most controversial movie
Japan Times
BUSINESS / DECENTRALIZATION SYMPOSIUM
Oct 3, 2007

Bureaucracy resists change, fights to retain its power

Public support for the "doshu-sei" system will depend on whether people can realize the benefits of ongoing efforts at decentralizing the nation's administrative powers, but the efforts have so far been hampered by the strong resistance of the central bureaucracy, panelists told the Sept. 18 symposium....
Reader Mail
Oct 2, 2007

Japanese politics baffles

To me, the results of the July 29 Upper House elections were a clear signal that the Japanese people were fed up not only with Shinzo Abe as prime minister but also with the governing Liberal Democratic Party and its policies as a whole.
EDITORIALS
Oct 2, 2007

Enough time to find shelter

On Monday, NHK started a broadcast service for earthquake warnings (kinkyu jishin sokuho), with private broadcast stations to follow suit. Rather than predict when and where earthquakes will strike, the warnings will tell how many seconds it will take tremors from a major earthquake to reach specific...
COMMENTARY
Sep 30, 2007

China might still the hands of the junta

BANGKOK — In 1989 Chinese troops, on orders of the government, mowed down demonstrators in Tiananmen Square, Beijing. It was a sad spectacle that China is still living down, though memory fades with every year of spectacular economic development — and with the nation's steady prideful movement toward...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 29, 2007

Scholars split over sanctions

Despite their long-standing good relations, the violence recently used to quell demonstrations in Myanmar that caused the death of Japanese video journalist Kenji Nagai has upped the pressure on Tokyo to impose sanctions on the military junta, experts say.
COMMENTARY
Sep 27, 2007

Crunch: a question of trust

LONDON — Financial markets all round the world, from New York to London to Tokyo, have been rattled by the recent squeeze on credit and lending, which originated in the United States. All kinds of lessons have been drawn from the experience, many of which boil down to the simple adage that dubious...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Sep 26, 2007

Tokyo Game Show misses Nintendo

This year's Tokyo Game Show was supposed to be bigger, but that doesn't mean the industry event was better. It was expanded from three days (one press, two public days) to four days (two press, two public) as Sony, Microsoft and third-party video game publishers played host at this year's Tokyo Game...
EDITORIALS
Sep 25, 2007

Mr. Fukuda at the helm

The Liberal Democratic Party's Diet members and prefectural branch representatives have elected Mr. Yasuo Fukuda, former chief Cabinet secretary of the Koizumi administration, as their new president, ending the political vacuum caused by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's sudden resignation. The greatest task...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Sep 25, 2007

Running circles round the Emperor

Some people run it, some cycle it, some simply walk it. Any way you do it, the route around the Imperial Palace has become Tokyo's best-known track.
SOCCER
Sep 24, 2007

Inamoto hoping to get career back on track in Frankfurt

FRANKFURT — It's fair to say that if Junichi Inamoto had begun his European adventure at Eintracht Frankfurt instead of Arsenal his star would probably be shining that much brighter now.
COMMENTARY
Sep 24, 2007

Okinawan state of mind

"An island of deep-seated resentment" — that was the first impression I had of Okinawa Prefecture on my visit there in late July. Everywhere in the island prefecture, I found monuments to the war dead. They number 419.
Reader Mail
Sep 23, 2007

Forced philosophy in Bhutan

Regarding David Howell's Aug. 30 article, "Happiness can't be legislated": Happiness is not measurable by economic and material prosperity, yet the Bhutanese regime makes every effort to force people to comply with the principles of happiness that a dictator propagated.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 23, 2007

TV 'kangaroo courts' led by excitable pundits make joke of law

The current box-office winner in Japan is "Hero," the movie spinoff of a popular TV series starring heartthrob Takuya Kimura as a nonconformist prosecutor. Now there's an oxymoron. In American pop culture, at least, prosecutors tend to be the bad guys since they represent the establishment, but in Japan...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / MAKING A DIFFERENCE
Sep 22, 2007

Children smile again thanks to art of healing

When you're just one person who wants to make a change in a world of 6 billion, effecting that change can be a little daunting. But for some people, waiting around for something to happen is a whole lot more worrisome.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 19, 2007

Japan needs global leaders: headhunter

Securing leaders with the experience to better manage local employees and their needs is becoming more urgent for Japanese companies that conduct business globally, said Paul Reilly, chairman of leading global executive search firm Korn/Ferry International.
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Sep 16, 2007

Postmodern sports for all

One night last month, while I was lazily channel-surfing at home, I happened on shot-putters doing their thing at the IAAF's World Athletics Championships in Osaka.
COMMENTARY
Sep 15, 2007

Taiwan's sad quest for U.N. membership

WATERLOO, Ontario — As the United Nations General Assembly begins its annual session later this month, it will refuse once again to confront an issue where the denial of reality intersects with a negation of the world body's core values.
JAPAN
Sep 15, 2007

Fukuda in lead to take over LDP

Yasuo Fukuda emerged Friday as the clear favorite in the race to replace Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as president of the Liberal Democratic Party, in what is shaping up to be a two-man contest with LDP Secretary General Taro Aso.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 13, 2007

Twisting history for unpleasant purposes

ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, New York — U.S. President George W. Bush is not generally known for his firm grasp of history. But this has not stopped him from using history to justify his policies. In a recent speech to American war veterans in Kansas City, he defended his aim to "stay the course" in Iraq by...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Sep 12, 2007

Feelings we share?

To what extent do animals consciously experience emotions?
COMMENTARY
Sep 9, 2007

Extreme events fire up the Greek fringe

LONDON — "How are our children going to survive in a land that is dead?" asked a survivor of the wildfires that seared much of southern Greece during the last week of August.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 7, 2007

The king of Kita Kyushu

Shinji Aoyama was in an up mood when The Japan Times met him at the office of his distributor, Style Jam. His new film, "Sad Vacation," opened the Horizons section at the Venice Film Festival last week, and though, when we met, he confessed himself nervous at the prospect of facing a foreign audience,...
COMMENTARY
Sep 6, 2007

China's image sinking fast

HONG KONG — Public opinion surveys taken in the United States and other countries around the world show that China's image has been badly dented in the wake of widespread reports of unsafe food, toxic toothpaste, dangerous toys and poisonous drugs.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 1, 2007

Adding insult to hot air at the Japanese BBQ

Some people blame global warming on farting cows, others blame it on farting vehicles. I blame it on Japanese BBQs.

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past