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Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 12, 2002

Bank receipts prove aide took kickbacks: lawmaker

A former secretary to farm minister Tadamori Oshima received at least 5 million yen in kickbacks from a consulting company executive for helping contractors land public works contracts, an opposition Democratic Party of Japan lawmaker said Monday.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Nov 10, 2002

Ishihara could be spiked with his own barbs

Exactly a year ago in the weekly women's magazine Shukan Josei, Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara shot off a few of his patented provocative statements. His remarks about middle-aged women were particularly noteworthy. "Old ladies have proved to be the biggest obstacle to the progress of civilization," he...
JAPAN
Nov 6, 2002

Victims of over-zealous media weigh new human rights bills

The media are both Kenichi Ino's worst enemy and strongest ally.
JAPAN / Media
Nov 3, 2002

Vernacular Views

Philosophy Professor Kenji Tsuchiya of Ochanomizu Women's University has got a big problem, as related in his column in the weekly Shukan Bunshun.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 27, 2002

At last, a family cartoon playing it for real

Since virtually everyone has grown up in one, "family" is one of the few dramatic themes that can safely be called universal, even if no two families can ever be the same. Nevertheless, the popular arts, television in particular, are filled with families who are meant to represent all families.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Oct 19, 2002

Crime writer racily exposes seamy side of Japan

It's a bit confusing when an author is called Guy Stanley but his card reads Stan Guy in English and Gai Stanri in katakana on the back.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Oct 13, 2002

Sports Day: the spirit of '64

"Have Japanese people already forgotten about soccer?" asks a recent advertisement for a satellite-TV station. The ad continues: "To all the Japanese people who were swept up in the soccer frenzy of the World Cup -- have you forgotten about soccer?"
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Oct 11, 2002

"Time Stops For No Mouse," "Hairy Bill"

"Time Stops For No Mouse," Michael Hoeye, Puffin Books; 2002; 262 pp. It's a mouse's world.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 6, 2002

When every channel is the same channel

Ever since the advent of that popular programming idea known as the "wide show" in the mid-1980s, so-called hard news and tabloid news have slowly merged into an alloy of informational reporting that defies easy categorization.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 29, 2002

Exactly when does old age really begin?

"Put simply, we are having fewer children and living longer," says Michelle Gunn, an Australian journalist and social-affairs writer. Our time is undeniably the age of longevity.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 27, 2002

Canada program offers help to isolated parents

A group of child-care experts is offering help to mothers in Japan via a Canadian parent-education program aimed at building self-esteem and creating a supportive network of friends, families and experts.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / VINELAND
Sep 22, 2002

Recession? What recession?

For many, the mere thought of Champagne is enough to make the pulse race and the tongue tingle. Josephine de Beauharnais, the wife of Napoleon and Empress of France 1796-99, once remarked that "making love without a bottle of Champagne alongside my bed is merely silly." For those looking to indulge in...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 22, 2002

The fallout of Japan's national energy policy

In Japan, Fumiko Kometani, the wife of American screenwriter Josh Greenfeld and mother of journalist Karl Taro Greenfeld, has a reputation for being a grouch. A longtime resident of the United States, she writes for a number of Japanese publications and very rarely has anything nice to say about either...
BUSINESS
Sep 19, 2002

Kim's calculated gamble to open up is born of desperation

PYONGYANG -- Even at the Koryo Hotel, one of the most luxurious accommodations for foreign visitors in Pyongyang, the energy shortage was apparent.
EDITORIALS
Sep 15, 2002

Make way for manga

A merican popular culture: We hear that phrase and immediately think of a juggernaut, a one-way tide rolling round the globe bearing its fatally attractive, tradition-squelching icons. It used to be John Wayne and jazz and Audrey Hepburn and Mickey Mouse. Then came McDonald's and Snoopy. More recently...
JAPAN / LEGACIES OF 9/11
Sep 6, 2002

Overreliance on U.S. market a gamble

When the United States was hit by terrorist attacks nearly a year ago, the economic fallout was predicted to be a nightmare.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Sep 5, 2002

Unions build political power

WASHINGTON -- U.S. President George W. Bush spent Labor Day just like he did last year. He attended a union picnic in Pennsylvania. The difference is that last year he was courting the steelworkers. This year it was the carpenters. He and his advisers seem intent on improving his showing among union...
COMMENTARY
Sep 4, 2002

Asian stereotypes die hard in U.S. national psyche

LOS ANGELES -- One of the best reading experiences in the United States this summer is the thriller "Absolute Rage," certainly a rage among applauding reviewers from Publishers Weekly to the Los Angeles Times. The 14th in a series of crime thrillers, it tells a well-informed tale about America's brutal...
JAPAN
Sep 3, 2002

Little-used Kansai airport likely to finish second runway

OSAKA - Eight years after it opened to great fanfare, Kansai International Airport looks likely to get a second runway in 2007, even as its financial problems continue to mount.
JAPAN
Sep 3, 2002

Journalists meet to discuss role of media in building peace

Young journalists from a number of politically unstable areas met in Tokyo late last week to discuss the media's role in building peace.
JAPAN
Aug 24, 2002

Former SDP lawmaker Tsujimoto returns 23 million yen in aides' pay

Kiyomi Tsujimoto, a former Social Democratic Party lawmaker who resigned from the Lower House in late March over alleged misuse of her secretaries' state-paid salaries, has returned more than 23 million yen, her office said Friday.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Aug 15, 2002

A load of computer clubs and a wad of financial advice

This column may be produced in Tokyo, but the newspaper circulates nationwide and indeed is read online worldwide. So we feel we are not doing our jobs properly to focus on Tokyo alone. While we have heard of a Macintosh computer group in Osaka, there must be others -- and in Nagoya, Fukuoka and Sapporo,...
JAPAN
Aug 13, 2002

Nippon Ham officials grilled over labeling scam

Farm ministry officials on Monday afternoon questioned executives of Nippon Meat Packers Inc., better known as Nippon Ham, in connection with a beef-mislabeling scam involving one of its subsidiaries.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2002

Former Foreign Minister Tanaka tenders Diet resignation

In a surprise move, former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka on Friday tendered her resignation to the House of Representatives in an apparent move to take responsibility for allegations that she misappropriated her secretaries' salaries.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / JET STREAM
Aug 9, 2002

Tuning in to another culture

Seoul native Kim Ji Sook, host of Fukuoka's Love FM Thursday night Inter Wave radio program, brings the sounds and the spirit of Korea to fans throughout northern Kyushu.
JAPAN
Aug 7, 2002

Suzuki bribe info faxed to property firm

The Tokyo District Public Prosecutor's Office mistakenly faxed a witness account about indicted lawmaker Muneo Suzuki's bribery case to a Tokyo real estate firm in June, a top official of the office said Tuesday.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Aug 1, 2002

Pot-shot summer with no room at the inn

Summertime, and the living is easy . . . for me, anyway.
JAPAN
Jul 31, 2002

Attack-response law dead in the water?

When the government submitted a set of emergency-response bills to the Diet in April, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi was breaking a decades-long taboo under the war-renouncing Constitution.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Jul 25, 2002

Health insurance, pension cash claims and odd-job search

It's been quite surprising to receive so many "thank yous" from readers, but more surprising has been that they come not only from Japan but from all over the the world. It seems a lot of people who have lived in Japan in the past and moved on read the column at www.japantimes.co.jp to keep up on things...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 25, 2002

Tanaka denies state-salary scam

Former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka on Wednesday categorically denied allegations she misappropriated the state-paid salaries of her secretaries.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?