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Reader Mail
Dec 14, 2008

Contradictions from Greenpeace

In the Dec. 9 Zeit Gist article, " 'Tokyo Two' fight to clear names," David McNeill describes the arrest last June of two activists of Greenpeace Japan, Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki, by Japanese police for allegedly taking a parcel of whale meat from the warehouse of delivery company Seino Transportation....
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 13, 2008

Beyond Pax Americana?

NEW YORK — It has become popular to suggest that when the dust settles from the global financial crisis, it may become clear that the United States-led postwar world has come to an end.
EDITORIALS
Dec 13, 2008

Ending the use of cluster bombs

About 100 countries, including Japan, signed a treaty Dec. 3 in Oslo to ban cluster bombs. It goes into effect about six months after 30 countries have ratified it. Japan should start the ratification procedure as soon as possible.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 12, 2008

Emerging strategic ties in Asia

LONDON — Before visiting Beijing to attend the Seventh Asia-Europe Meeting summit in Beijing in October, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stopped over in Tokyo. It was his second visit to Japan since assuming office in 2004 and underlined the rapidly evolving strategic realities in Asia.
COMMENTARY
Dec 12, 2008

Obama and the vets: caring for a generation

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — When Eric K. Shinseki, the first four-star U.S. Army general of Japanese- American ethnicity, was still his service branch's chief of staff, he became a symbol of doubt about official competence in pursuit of the Iraq war.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 10, 2008

Managing the international economic crisis

"After the Storm?" was the main title of the editorial of Economic Outlook 83 published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris last May. Developments since then have been such that it would have been a disaster for OECD forecasters if the question mark had not been...
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Dec 10, 2008

Rondo running the show for Celtics

NEW YORK — After visiting the Indiana Pacers at Conseco Fieldhouse on Tuesday, the 19-2 Celtics invade our nation's capital on Thursday. Given the way they're playing, David Stern has canceled the remainder of the season, called off the playoffs and ordered them to go straight to the White House.
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Dec 9, 2008

Shinkansen about more than speed

Shinkansen stand as global symbols of Japanese technological innovation. Debuting just in time for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, the bullet trains continue to carry people across the nation at record speed.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / JAPAN-U.S. SYMPOSIUMS
Dec 8, 2008

Obama victory opens door to broader relations

The election of Barack Obama as the next U.S. president offers opportunities for broader cooperation between Japan and the United States, which focused on the military aspects of the alliance during the eight years of the Bush administration, experts told a recent symposium in Tokyo.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Dec 7, 2008

Graduates' security goes to pot

Last week, a 25-year-old University of Tokyo graduate was arrested for allegedly posting death threats on his blog. The police say that the man, who has been unemployed since graduating from Japan's most prestigious university, had written that he would kill members of the education ministry for misleading...
CULTURE / Books
Dec 7, 2008

A bend in time, disengagement and the life of the mind

BIRNBAUM: A Novel of Inner Space, by Michael Hoffman. Printed Matter Press, 2008, 321 pp., ¥2,000 (paper) In writing about the process involved in the creation of this novel, Michael Hoffman observed that "Often as I wrote, I had no idea where this was going." This sounds a little like the literary...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 6, 2008

Tamogami essay fits 'outrageous' conspiracy theory mold

As a board member of The Academy of Outrageous Books, Shunichi Karasawa sees parallels between the controversial essay written by sacked Air Self-Defense Force chief Toshio Tamogami, an apologist for Japan's wartime aggression, and classic "outrageous" conspiracy theories.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 5, 2008

Politicians failing to engage youth

One of the oldest rules in politics the world over is that young people stay away in droves.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Dec 5, 2008

Shonen Knife "Super Group"

I have a very old friend who's always hated Osaka rock ambassadresses Shonen Knife. He thinks they're not a serious band — but he's missing the point. When the world around us is gray and dark, and the news talks of terrorists and financial depression, what we need are songs about slugs, deer biscuits...
EDITORIALS
Dec 4, 2008

Stellar U.S. security team

Whatever doubts may have existed about U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's foreign policy should be put to rest since he announced his national security team. The group is notable for its experience and levelheadedness. Perhaps most significant is the self-confidence the selections reveal: Mr. Obama...
Reader Mail
Dec 4, 2008

A lot of outlaws in the making

I urge The Japan Times to publish further details of the recently passed Japanese law banning "survival knives." If the law does indeed ban, without further qualification, all two-sided knives with blades longer than 5 cm, it bans most German and French chef knives, Swiss Army knives, Chinese cleavers,...
BUSINESS
Dec 4, 2008

Aso to break with Koizumi reforms

With the economy in recession and public approval ratings low, Prime Minister Taro Aso signaled Wednesday that Japan must depart from the reformist fiscal policies pursued by former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and his successors.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 3, 2008

Failed governance allowed attacks

MUMBAI — In most cities of South Asia, hidden beneath the grime and neglect of extreme poverty, there exists a little Somalia waiting to burst out and infect the body politic. This netherworld, patrolled and nourished by criminals who operate a vast black-market economy, has bred, in Mumbai, a community...
COMMENTARY
Dec 3, 2008

Moving back to socialism?

The "ism" enthusiasts are out in force again. These are the analysts and commentators who see everything in strictly ideological terms of socialism versus capitalism, more state control versus less state control. Just now they are all convinced that the pendulum is swinging toward state control, that...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Dec 2, 2008

Back to the baths: Otaru revisited

The story is familiar to regular readers of Zeit Gist. Debito Arudou, a naturalized Japanese citizen, originally from America, was living in Sapporo, Hokkaido, and had heard of the Yunohana public bath's policy of denying entry to foreigners. In 1999, media in tow, he decided to put that onsen's policy...

Longform

Totopa in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward was picked by consultants TTNE as the best sauna of the year.
Japan’s sauna movement: Relax, refresh, repeat