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Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jun 28, 2014

Tooling up for war: Can Japan benefit from lifting the arms export ban?

The Paris-based Eurosatory is one of the world's biggest defense and security industry trade shows, drawing specialists from nearly 90 countries to view the latest in military hardware. Among the tanks, drones, military helicopters and police riot vehicles that were exhibited last month, 13 Japanese...
EDITORIALS
Jun 28, 2014

Hong Kong's democratic 'farce'

The prospect of a clash between Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland has become more real in recent weeks as Hong Kong residents participate in a poll on how to select their top leader. Although it is not legally binding, the ballot has angered Beijing.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 24, 2014

America's addiction to war

Somewhere out there in an alternative universe, we should expect a more rational reaction to Barack Obama's announcement that he plans to re-invade Iraq. Perhaps a half-dozen Cabinet members would rush into the Oval Office and bundle the president off to an institution that can give him the treatment he seems to require. Why are American politicians addicted to war?
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Jun 24, 2014

U.S. top court upholds some Obama carbon curbs

The United States Supreme Court on Monday largely upheld the Obama administration's authority to curb greenhouse gases from major emitters like power plants and refineries in a ruling that nonetheless exempted some smaller sources from the regulation.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Jun 24, 2014

Senior Afghan poll official quits, opens way for Abdullah return to race

Afghan presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah, who pulled out of the race alleging vote-rigging, indicated he might return after a senior election official resigned Monday.
EDITORIALS
Jun 23, 2014

Chance for court to right a wrong

Surviving defendants convicted of trespassing on a U.S. air base in western Tokyo 57 years ago seek a retrial of their case because of their fear that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is using language in the original judgment to support his attempt to have the Constitution reinterpreted in a way enabling Japan to exercise the right of collective self-defense.
COMMUNITY / Voices / COMMUNITY CHEST
Jun 23, 2014

ASIJ abuse scandal stirs dark memories among readers

Some letters in response to Jon Mitchell's The Foreign Element articles about sexual abuse by late American School in Japan teacher Jack Moyer.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 20, 2014

Americans should be worried about polarization

Americans should worry about a new Pew report on political polarization not because there's too much genuine ideological competition, but because our most energetic citizens appear to be dividing every more coherently into factions that can't stand each other.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Jun 18, 2014

Japan's 'no immigration principle' looking as solid as ever

In contrast to Hidenori Sakanaka's unbridled optimism, I argue that Japan has little prospect of becoming a 'migrant nation' anytime soon.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 17, 2014

A requiem for technocracy

Now that science's postwar charisma has faded, politicians are debating the safety of genetically modified foods, the hazards of extracting shale oil and gas, and the impact of global warming without regard for scientific evidence — as if the issues were morality plays.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Jun 16, 2014

Pakistan resumes airstrikes to flush insurgents from border region

Pakistani fighter jets resumed airstrikes in North Waziristan on Monday, a day after the army announced the start of a major military operation to flush insurgents out of the volatile region bordering Afghanistan.
COMMENTARY / Japan / COUNTERPOINT
Jun 14, 2014

Hadid's curse: Mammoth monstrosity threatens Tokyo's greenbelt

The government needs to pull the plug on the planned new Olympic stadium designed by the celebrity British-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jun 14, 2014

Noda says Abe buying into 'voodoo economics'

Sour grapes are in season in Tokyo as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's predecessor steps up and slams the incumbent's tax plans.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jun 11, 2014

China seeks UNESCO listing for Nanking Massacre, sex slave archives; Japan protests

The government has filed a protest against China's applications to have what it says are historical documents on the 1937 Nanking Massacre and Japan's wartime "comfort women" brothel system registered in the U.N. archive program, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said Wednesday.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 11, 2014

U.S. foreign policy marked by blatant hypocrisy

It is a truth universally acknowledged that behavior by others inconsistent with social norms is condemned as hypocrisy but similar discrepancies in our own conduct is rationalized as understandable prioritization in the face of multiple goals. When the military deposed Egypt's first freely elected president,...
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jun 6, 2014

A travesty of justice

The Nagoya High Court has turned down the eighth request for retrial by an 88-year-old man on death row for the 1961 fatal poisoning of five women at a community meeting in Mie Prefecture.
Japan Times
WORLD
Jun 6, 2014

Brazil says it cannot guarantee readiness for World Cup

On a day when a transport workers's strike brought part of Brazil's biggest city to a halt, Brazil's Sports Minister said it was impossible to promise his country would be ready for next week's opening match of the World Cup.
Japan Times
JAPAN / FOCUS
Jun 4, 2014

Atop Pacific 'Ring of Fire,' debate flares over volcanic risk to Japan's nuclear plants

In the three years since the Fukushima disaster, Japan's utilities have pledged $15 billion to harden their nuclear plants against earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes and terrorist attacks.
Reader Mail
Jun 4, 2014

Discontent among Europeans

The June 2 editorial, "Europe takes a beating," completely mischaracterizes UKIP (the UK Independence Party) by calling it "far right." Fascist, neo-fascist and Nazi parties are far right in their disregard of democratic procedures, public opinion and the wishes of electorates. Thus "far right" is far...
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jun 2, 2014

Conclude an East Asia FTA

Despite diplomatic problems among the three, business delegations from Japan, China and South Korea recently agreed that a free trade agreement should be concluded soon.
LIFE / Language / WELL SAID
Jun 1, 2014

Watashi-wa Gray-san-no an-ga ii-to omoimasu

Today, we introduce the proper usage of u601duff08u304au3082uff09u3046 and u601du3063u3066u3044u308b, which both mean 'think.' There are some points to consider when using the verb of thought, u601du3046.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 31, 2014

AKB48's business model is likely to survive media attacks

The universe shifted on the afternoon of Sunday, May 25, when a young, unemployed man attacked two members of the all-female idol collective AKB48 and a male security staffer with a folding saw during a fan event in the city of Takizawa, Iwate Prefecture. Or, at least, that's how the media reacted. Some...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
May 31, 2014

When industry works in step with nature

It was about 15 years ago when an old friend, Yoshito Umezaki, invited me to dinner in Tokyo to meet a friend of his named Masayoshi "Mike" Ushikubo — "a really great guy who loves mountains, travels all over the world and is a company president who has a little problem."
COMMENTARY / World
May 30, 2014

Drone memo author should be in jail

Finally we will get a peek at the twisted legal opinion that the White House uses to justify using drones to blow up anyone, anywhere, including American citizens on American soil, for any reason the president deems fit.
Japan Times
JAPAN
May 29, 2014

Tokyo, Canberra test sub fleet export waters

Japan will get the chance to pursue an unprecedented military export deal when its defense and foreign ministers meet their Australian counterparts in Tokyo next month.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
May 28, 2014

Japan: a haven for the psychologically troubled

For the troubled Western expat in Japan, the reality of being on another continent can collide with normalized Japanese antisocialism to form a cocktail effective in tuning out a lot of the 'just be a normal adult' voices.
Reader Mail
May 28, 2014

Crack down on unpaid overtime

Regarding the May 21 Bloomberg article "Foreign domestics seen as aiding working mothers": I have to say that the solution to keeping women in the workplace and to increasing family size lies not with either increasing the number of domestic helpers (which would benefit only those women who could afford...

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