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Reader Mail
Jun 12, 2008

Consider the effect of medication

With regard to the murderous rampage in Akihabara, this type of bizarre behavior has been frequently noted among people who are under the influence of selective seretonin re-uptake inhibitors, such as Prozac. Many of the school and workplace shootings in America, for example, have been carried out by...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 12, 2008

One man, two worlds

Ryosuke Hashiguchi is one of the few gay filmmakers in Japan to have had a measure of popular success making films with gay themes. His third film, "Hush" (2002), about a gay couple whose life changes when one of them is drafted into becoming a father by a desperate woman, was an indie hit, as well as...
EDITORIALS
Jun 12, 2008

'Anyone' was a target

Sunday's brutal indiscriminate slaying of seven people in Tokyo's Akihabara district is both a tragedy and a horrific crime. It took a 25-year-old man about five minutes to commit the crimes as shoppers were enjoying Sunday afternoon in a temporary vehicle-free zone in the world's largest electronics...
Reader Mail
Jun 12, 2008

Question for next U.S. president

Let me congratulate U.S. Democratic Party candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for having fought very courageously for the presidential nomination. Although I welcome last week's outcome, I can't get rid of lingering thoughts that Clinton could also prove just as capable.
JAPAN
Jun 12, 2008

Upper House hits Fukuda with censure

The opposition-controlled Upper House passed an unprecedented, but nonbinding, censure motion Wednesday against Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda, hoping to marshal public discontent with his stagnant administration into calls for a snap election.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 12, 2008

Lily Franky's first starring role plunges him into a 'dark place'

L ily Franky is a true multitalent, having found success as an illustrator, designer, essayist, lyricist, photographer, novelist and band vocalist. His 2005 autobiographical novel "Tokyo Tower: Okan to Boku to Tokidoki Oton (Tokyo Tower: Mom and Me and Sometimes Dad)," in which he described his relationship...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jun 12, 2008

Fukutoshin subway line debuts

Part of a new subway line that will snake down through Tokyo to link Saitama and Kanagawa prefectures will open Saturday, giving the public a new convenient way to access the crowded Shibuya, Shinjuku and Ikebukuro districts.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 12, 2008

Another looming food crisis

The United Nations held a summit in Rome earlier this month to find solutions to the global food crisis. The focus was on grain shortages and high prices that have recently roiled countries around the world, causing mass protests and political instability in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jun 12, 2008

Actor Nomura brings noh to new audiences

If you've ever napped through a noh performance, you're not alone. But this 600-year-old Japanese theatrical genre is being updated to make it more of a 21st-century entertainment than a Japanophile's endurance test.
BUSINESS / G8 COUNTDOWN
Jun 12, 2008

Soaring prices pose challenge to G8 finance chiefs

Finance chiefs from the Group of Eight countries are expected to discuss Friday in Osaka how their economies can tame the soaring oil and food prices battering businesses and consumers around the world.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jun 12, 2008

The space to act out in Shizuoka

Shizuoka Performing Arts Center is Japan's first so-called European-style public theater. Founded by the Shizuoka prefectural government in 1997, it has its own company (also called SPAC) and an artistic director in residence when the norm is for public theater companies to share venues and for artistic...
BUSINESS
Jun 12, 2008

New Citibank Japan chief named

Citigroup Inc., the biggest U.S. bank, named Robert A. Snell president and representative director of Citibank Japan Ltd. effective July 1, the New York-based company said in an e-mailed statement Wednesday.
Reader Mail
Jun 12, 2008

Whiff of hypocrisy in gate-tending

For Japanese people to express antipathy toward allowing the population of resident foreigners to rise suggests not a small dose of xenophobia. For a foreigner in Japan to echo the sentiment adds a whiff of hypocrisy.
BUSINESS
Jun 12, 2008

Focus on batteries for Toyota hybrids

Looking to put a charge into sales of its electric vehicles, Toyota Motor Corp. said Wednesday it will boost efforts next month to develop next-generation batteries that can outperform lithium-ion cells.
BUSINESS
Jun 12, 2008

Wholesale prices jumped 4.7% in May

Wholesale prices in May rose at their fastest pace in 27 years, signaling soaring energy costs may erode corporate profits and bring an end to the economy's longest postwar expansion, the Bank of Japan said Wednesday.
Reader Mail
Jun 12, 2008

Don't despair of life's possibilities

Akihabara residents should not worry about what happened Sunday afternoon. These things happen in all countries, including mine, America and Europe. In my country, hungry poor people still abound, yet they don't despair of hope that the coming days will be favorable. I believe that the man who ran amok...
COMMENTARY
Jun 11, 2008

Washington and Baghdad: the treaty that isn't

In the Sherlock Holmes story "Silver Blaze," the world's most famous private detective refers to "the curious incident of the dog in the night." "But the dog did nothing in the night," replies his interlocutor. "That was the curious incident," says Holmes. The dogs aren't barking over the U.S.-Iraq treaty,...
BASKETBALL
Jun 11, 2008

Tabuse to play in summer league

Point guard Yuta Tabuse has been invited to play for the New Jersey Nets' Orlando Pro Summer League team next month in Orlando, Fla., according to Tabuse's personal Web site.

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