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May 02, 2024
 

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WASHINGTON UPDATE

COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jan 3, 2002
A changed U.S. greets 2002
WASHINGTON -- Welcome to Year One of the time thereafter. If there is a constant in the commentaries on Sept. 11, it is that it was a day whose events changed the way we will live forever.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Dec 26, 2001
At last, Congress tackles election reform
WASHINGTON -- It was just a year ago last week that the Supreme Court elected George W. Bush our 43rd president. The mess of the elections in 2000, from the faulty voting machines in Florida to the long counts in western states (remember it took almost a month to declare a winner in the Senate election in Washington), the imperfections of the American election machinery were hung out for everyone to see. There was an immediate outcry to "Do Something!"
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Dec 6, 2001
Bush scores high leadership marks
WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush continues to enjoy the support of the American people for his prosecution of the war against terrorism. His job rating on the war effort remains just under 90 percent, where it has been since it all began. The military successes in Afghanistan have quelled concerns that had begun to be raised during the preparatory phases. Now that American forces have entered the fray and the Taliban have dissembled, the success on the ground has reassured the electorate that the Bush program is succeeding.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Nov 24, 2001
U.S. civil liberties a needless war casualty
WASHINGTON -- Support for U.S. President George W. Bush and his handling of the war effort remains high, and the military success will help maintain this support level. Bush is testing his popular support regularly here at home as he pushes to implement his conservative legislative agenda, which is meeting with resistance on a broadening basis.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Nov 8, 2001
Partisan politics heat up
WASHINGTON -- You can feel the change. It is not back to politics as usual -- pre-Sept. 11 variety -- but the partisan blood is flowing again in the body politic. In the spirit of accommodation that has marked the post-attack period, Congress has been passing major measures of great consequence on a consensual basis. Consensus on some measures, like the antiterrorism act, had to be hammered out in tough negotiations by congressional and administration leaders, but in the end, the final products have been accepted by wide margins.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Aug 29, 2001
A bearded Gore and the shrinking surplus
WASHINGTON -- At long last, Al Gore has reappeared! He is pursuing the political training school program that he had floated in a more full-blown way last spring. Al, sporting a full beard, is working with his fellow Tennessee loser, Republican presidential wannabe Lamar Alexander, training young people in political action. A number of former Gore staffers are the lecturers. The trainees are destined, according to Al, to work in the elections of 2002 . . . and maybe to help him in 2004.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Aug 9, 2001
Times get tougher for Bush
WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush has now been in the Oval Office for a little more than one half year, and it has been the best of times and the worst of times for him.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jul 19, 2001
Campaign finance reform bill continues to dominate a divided U.S. Congress
This was "the week that was" for campaign finance reform. The stakes were high. The votes were close. You could cut the tension around the Capital with a knife. And when it was over, just like all the years in the recent past, there was no result. The only winner may well have been U.S. President George W. Bush, who doesn't really want to sign a campaign reform bill and may now be off the hook, at least for the moment.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jul 5, 2001
Battle continues over U.S. health care
It is holiday time again as Congress takes its Independence Day break. Pauses in the legislative schedule tend to provide opportunities for deadlines, and this one has been no exception. Democratic Sen. Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the newly minted Majority Leader, had suggested that the break would begin after the Senate finished his priority business, the Patients' Bill of Rights.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jun 23, 2001
U.S. Democrats take control
Despite the confusion surrounding the changing of power in the Senate, things are still getting done in Washington. The Senate recently passed the education bill, a major item from the agenda of President George W. Bush, and sent it on to conference with the House of Representatives that had already passed a companion bill. That, plus the tax bill already signed, Bush can call it a rather successful first five months. He has passed the top two priorities on his agenda under difficult and unusual circumstances.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jun 7, 2001
Jeffords bombshell overshadows tax bill
It has been interesting to watch the blame game explode in the week since U.S. Sen. James Jeffords decided to leave the Republican Party. In the immediate aftermath, there was a sense of disbelief, mixed with a bit of "we'll get a Democrat to switch and all will be well."
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
May 28, 2001
Time for Bush to test his healing powers
Washington is not in an area normally vulnerable to earthquakes, but on Tuesday, the earth began to shake all over town. The epicenter of the quake was up on Capitol Hill; specifically, in Suite 728 of the Hart Senate Office Building, the office of Sen. James Jeffords, the junior senator from Vermont. He was making a decision that would shift the Capitol landscape in a dramatic and substantial way.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
May 23, 2001
Rookie president seizes the political initiative by zeroing in on a few core issues
Our first MBA president is managing the agenda of action in Washington in textbook fashion. Unlike his predecessor or his father, George W. Bush is limiting his exposure to the myriad issues waiting to be tackled and fights available to be fought. By this time in his first year, President Bill Clinton had dozens of issues in play and firefights to control everywhere. Bush, in contrast, is focusing on fewer issues and driving them hard.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
May 10, 2001
High marks for Bush at home
It's 100 days and counting for U.S. President George W. Bush. So far, so good. His approval ratings are better than those of most of his predecessors at this stage. He survived his first international crisis nicely, achieving the return of the American aircrew who ditched their EP-3 surveillance plane in China.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Apr 19, 2001
Bush's mettle gets put to test
Chinese pilot Wang Wei gave U.S. President George W. Bush his first critical foreign-policy test. Wei's collision over the South China Sea with a Navy reconnaissance plane, which dropped 24 U.S. military personnel into the hands of the Chinese military on Hainan Island, provided an excellent course in crisis management for the new president.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Apr 12, 2001
Environment takes back seat to U.S. economic recovery
U.S. President George W. Bush continued his personal campaign to change previous U.S. policy two weeks ago by renouncing the nation's commitment to limit industrial emissions of carbon dioxide. He did it shortly after Environmental Protection Agency administrator Christine Todd Whitman had given the international treaty on global warming a hearty thumbs up.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Mar 22, 2001
Bush rises while Mori falls
We are just past the halfway mark in the first 100 days of the term of U.S. President George W. Bush. How is he doing? How is he doing it? What is he changing?
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Mar 5, 2001
Bush works on tax cuts while Clinton dodges more controversy
WASHINGTON -- "Beauty and the Beast" was on television Monday night -- the movie, not the continuing news saga of our current president and the most recent former one. That show seems to be a never-ending saga.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Feb 22, 2001
Selling tax cuts to Congress
U.S. President George W. Bush continues his attempt to make friends and influence important constituencies. He has spent more time with the Congressional Black Caucus than with the Republican leadership. He has traveled to schools to promote his education priorities. He has been to small businesses explaining his tax-cutting plans. He visited military bases to build rapport with the troops and discuss his plans for national defense.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Feb 8, 2001
With Cabinet approved, Bush gets down to business
WASHINGTON -- George W. Bush is off to a good and fast start. In his first days as U.S. president, he has begun to soften his relationships with his adversaries, organize his control over the vast bureaucracy of the federal government, initiate innovative programs and promote his promised legislative initiatives. And he has done so in a pleasant, non-confrontational manner, entertaining the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate, members of the Kennedy family and the Congressional Black Caucus.
'So hot you can't breathe': Extreme heat hits the Philippines
A pedestrian cools himself with a folding hand fan as he waits for a ride along a road in Manila on Wednesday, as extreme heat hit the Philippines.
Did Japan intervene to prop up the yen? Analysts think it did.
A man walks past an electronic board displaying the exchange rate for the yen against the U.S. dollar (right) in Tokyo on Tuesday.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.
Number of vacant homes in Japan hits record high of 9 million
A vacant house in Tokyo is seen demolished in January 2020.
Weak yen fattens tourist wallets in Japan
People visit the Ameya Yokocho market in Tokyo's Ueno district during the Golden Week holiday on Tuesday.
Yellow sand allergy: A health issue made worse by climate change
A screenshot of the Meteorological Agency's satellite image of clouds and yellow sand (in pink) on Sunday.
Climate change, chalky grains and the risks for Japan’s rice farmers
A farmer plants seedlings in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture. Japan’s self sufficiency rate for rice is nearly 100%, compared with 38% for food overall, on a calorie basis.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Theaster Gates’ ambitious ‘Afro-Mingei’ brings Black Chicago to Tokyo
Theaster Gates' “A Heavenly Chord” lines up church pews before seven speakers and a Hammond B3 organ, a type of electric organ prevalent in Black American churches.
Casa del Cibo: A thriving jewel born from Tohoku’s harsh past
When chef Ryohei Ikemi moved to Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, and opened Casa del Cibo in 2011, it was the first proper Italian restaurant in the city.

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