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BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Oct 1, 2007

Fukuda and the 'Cabinet of the Walking Dead'

Atitle in the Financial Times' Lex Column caught my eye Wednesday. The item, "Japan's Zombies," turned out to be a very readable story about large Japanese electronics companies. But until I got down to actually reading the piece, I was totally convinced it was about Japan's latest Cabinet.
Reader Mail
Sep 30, 2007

Dilemma for America's left

Ted Rall's Sept. 24 article, "Ugly truth of antiwar lefties," makes some important points about the hypocrisy of the antiwar movement. What he fails to point out, however, is how rightwing, prowar interests have so strongly defined the debate that the left is now forced to sculpt their argument to be...
Reader Mail
Sep 30, 2007

Union accepts Nova teachers

Regarding the Sept. 25 article in the Community section "Advice for teachers": The statement that "The General Union and Nambu decided on a policy that we won't take new members if Nova goes bankrupt" is not an accurate reflection of the General Union's policy. The General Union has no special policy...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Sep 30, 2007

Fighters clinch PL by routing Marines

Trey Hillman is sure making his last run memorable.
Reader Mail
Sep 30, 2007

Time to kill the dolphin cull

Kudos to Nigel Barker for his brutally honest photos, and to Boyd Harnell for his equally succinct commentary, for the Sept. 19 article "Tokyo sanctions an extended cull of Taiji dolphins." As a former resident of Japan, I know that in some corners there are those who not only will never see the cruelty...
Reader Mail
Sep 30, 2007

'Modern' Japanese harder to read

I found Tomoko Otake's Sept. 23 article, "Japanese: a language in a state of flux" -- about the invasion of modern Japanese by gairaigo (foreign loan words) -- very interesting. Fifteen years ago, as an education ministry scholarship student, I studied Japanese at the International Center of Keio University....
JAPAN
Sep 30, 2007

Supreme Court rejects appeal of denied disability allowances

Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura on Friday signed an international convention for protecting and promoting the rights and dignity of people with disabilities. Japan is the 115th nation to sign the convention.
EDITORIALS
Sep 30, 2007

The real stakes in Taiwan

There was never any doubt about the outcome of Taiwan's bid to regain a seat in the United Nations. For the 15th time in as many years, the U.N. rejected Taipei's call to return to the world body. The application did not even make it to the General Assembly agenda, having been blocked by the General...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Sep 30, 2007

Pension-system special, Japanese 'Twilight Zone', embalming drama

At the top of the list of things worrying the Japanese is the national pension system.
COMMENTARY
Sep 30, 2007

China might still the hands of the junta

BANGKOK — In 1989 Chinese troops, on orders of the government, mowed down demonstrators in Tiananmen Square, Beijing. It was a sad spectacle that China is still living down, though memory fades with every year of spectacular economic development — and with the nation's steady prideful movement toward...
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Sep 30, 2007

Asashoryu fiasco illustrates incompetence of sumo's leaders

Enough already.
Reader Mail
Sep 30, 2007

Blame game is no remedy

Japan has been my home for almost 10 years. It has many good points and I would not have stayed this long if it didn't. However, more and more, I am hearing the same complaint about the negative influence of American culture on Japanese people. It is their opinion that the reason for this breakdown...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 30, 2007

Cancer may kill, but it can also revitalize a flagging media career

Right now there's a commercial on TV for the American insurance company AFLAC featuring veteran journalist Shuntaro Torigoe, who was diagnosed with cancer two years ago. It shows the 67-year-old reporter in what looks like home videos undergoing tests, or about to be operated on, or clowning around with...
Reader Mail
Sep 30, 2007

Breaking away from the U.S.

Regarding Robyn Lim's Sept. 20 article, "Defense debate bordering on bizarre": It's Lim's inchoate ramblings that are bizarre. Lim fails to grasp Japanese concern that Shinzo Abe and his predecessor Junichiro Koizumi brought Japan too close for comfort to the United States militarily. A poll showed...
CULTURE / Books
Sep 30, 2007

The Murakami addiction

Murakami Haruki: The Simulacrum in Contemporary Japanese Culture, by Michael R. Seats, 2006, 384 pp., $70 (cloth) Haruki Murakami's novels have much in common with potato chips. Both are often addictive and both are often ultimately unsatisfying. Yet one can't help but buy another bag of chips at the...
CULTURE / Books
Sep 30, 2007

Beyond darkness: sleepless in Tokyo

After Dark by Haruki Murakami, translated by Jay Rubin. Knopf, 2007, 208 pp., $22.95 (cloth) If New York is the city that never sleeps, Tokyo is the city of sleepless souls — or so it appears in the cinematic narrative of "After Dark," among the most hauntingly detached of Haruki Murakami's nine novels...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Sep 30, 2007

Sophistication from improvisation

Kitano Takeshi. London: British Film Institute, 2007, 272 pp., with photos. £16.99 (paper) This is a brilliant book on a mercurial subject. Takeshi Kitano is an actor and film director, ubiquitous on television as well, who has become a media event. His persona has splintered and he stands Janus-faced...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Sep 30, 2007

Bilingual blanks are nothing to kobosu your guchi about

Last week in this column, I addressed the trials and tribulations of bringing up a child to be bilingual — both for parents and children. As anyone who has been down that road knows, it's what Japanese people would call shinan no waza (an arduous task).

Longform

An illustration features the Japanese signs for "ganbare" (good luck) and the Deaflympics, which will be held between Nov. 15 and 26.
A century of Deaf sport finds its moment in Tokyo